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About the author • Education • Work

Maja Cvetković Sotirov

Maja C. S. / Maya C. S.

Where knowledge becomes a story

Writer and Master of Philology. In her work she brings together literature, history, science and family heritage, turning real people, places and events into adventures written for children and grown-ups alike.

A life and career spanning Serbia, France and America, family roots and the experience of different cultures shaped Maja’s literary world — a world where past and present, fact and imagination meet, and where reading becomes a path to knowledge, understanding and growing up.

  • Authorial concept Maya Story — The Voice of Childhood An authorial concept of family literature About the concept
  • Her work Children’s literature and family literature
  • Education Master of Philology in Serbian language and literature
  • Profession Licensed teacher of Serbian language and literature
Browse the books Contact and collaboration
Maja Cvetković Sotirov in front of a painted portrait of Nikola Tesla, at the Đura Jakšić House
The Đura Jakšić House, Belgrade — artwork by R. Memišević Photo: Zoran Bulović
Maja. C. S.

A story of belonging

Maja Cvetković Sotirov is a Serbian writer and a master of philology whose literary sensibility was shaped by family roots, by a life spent between different cities and countries, and by encounters with different cultures.

In her writing, origin is not merely a place of birth or a line in a biography. It is memory, a family story, a language and an inheritance that travels along with a person.

Out of that meeting of different worlds came a body of writing that leads readers through Serbia, France and America, through real historical events and the lives of great people, but always returns to the universal questions: who are we, where do we come from, what do we carry with us and what do we leave to the generations that come after us?

An education that became part of the writing

A master of philology by training and a licensed teacher of Serbian language and literature, Maja has woven her knowledge of language, literature, teaching methodology, the history of the language and lexicology into the way she writes.

In her books a historical or scientific fact is never an end in itself. It becomes the beginning of a story. Nikola Tesla, Blaise Pascal, Leonardo da Vinci, the great world exhibitions, inventions, historic cities and events enter the world of fiction so that a child may come to know them through the adventure, the emotion and the experience of the characters.

Over time this shaped an authorial approach in which literature, knowledge and imagination are never separated.

Family literature

At the heart of Maja’s work lies family literature — literature that does not speak to the child alone.

It is a story a parent discovers, and then shares with the child. A story that opens conversations about friendship, family, difference, loneliness, science, history, technology, responsibility and growing up.

A child does not grow up apart from the world of adults. A good story can become the place where the two of them meet.

Maya Story The Voice of Childhood

Out of that literary, educational and personal experience came Maya Story — the voice of childhood, an original concept of family literature that brings together story, knowledge and growing up.

The idea is not to hand the child ready-made answers, but to awaken curiosity, so that the child will want to: open one more book, look into the person they have just read about, find a city on the map, ask the grown-ups a question and understand something that only yesterday felt far away.

Learning can begin with a story. A book is the safest place to grow up.

About the family literature concept

Roots and the road

Maja Cvetković Sotirov was born on 27 April 1980 into an old Serbian family in Pirot, part of whose family tree grew for several generations in Pirot and Belgrade, so that the Božilović name is found today both in the north and in the south-east of the country; on her father’s side she is from Niš.

She completed the science and mathematics programme at the grammar school in her home town, and then went on to study literature in Niš, at the Faculty of Philosophy. She studied Serbian language and literature, and for a time Russian language and literature as well; she graduated from the Department of Serbian Language and Literature and then (under the new curriculum) took a master’s degree in Philology at the same faculty, in the field of teaching methodology, history of the language and lexicology. She is a licensed teacher of Serbian language and literature and speaks two languages: English and Russian.

She spent part of her life in Niš and then continued her studies in Belgrade, preparing for postgraduate work in sociolinguistics in the United States. Soon afterwards she met her present husband, who was living in France at the time, and with whom she now has a son, Luka.

Maja’s first book took shape in the French towns of Clermont-Ferrand and Troyes, and little Luka was his mother’s support and the inspiration for the story about the famous scientist Blaise Pascal.

When you are handed a family archive — letters, documents, medals — and your suitcases are packed with a spiritual and material inheritance spanning generations, shot through with the storms and trials of history, then I am certain that the best way to look for some answers about the fate of your ancestors is to study national philology.

Filoblog of the Faculty of Philosophy in Niš

You fall, you get up — but never, ever forget to get up!

Maja Cvetković Sotirov for “Student” magazine
An illustration of Nikola Tesla over the drawings of his patents
Illustration by V. Mančić (from Magical Sails — A Nikola Tesla Story)

A sailing ship across the ocean

“Magical Sails — A Nikola Tesla Story” was published in New York, on Manhattan. The book is carried by the world’s most reputable retailers, and our children’s author was a guest of the famous American bookstore chain “Barnes & Noble” in San Diego. She also held launches in Chicago, Milwaukee and New York.

The translator is Jelena Vitezović, daughter of the celebrated Serbian writer Milovan Vitezović.

Book launches
  • Njujork
  • San Dijego
  • Čikago
  • Milvoki
On sale through
  • Barnes & Noble
  • Walmart
  • Amazon
  • ThriftBooks
US editions

A book and knowledge for every child

Maja campaigns for access to education — a book and knowledge for every child, wherever that child may be, in a village or in a city. That is why she and her team of collaborators also publish free electronic stories for children.

Her work

  1. 2017/2018.

    The French Adventure

    A story about Blaise Pascal and the first calculating machine

  2. 2020.

    The Boy Who Did Not Want to Plant a Tree

  3. 2020.

    The Boy and the Fairy

    A story about growing up, being different, and the choice that shapes the world

  4. 2021.

    Magical Sails

    A story about Nikola Tesla — published in the USA as Magical Sails: A Nikola Tesla Story

  5. 2022.

    Christmas Eve with Tesla

    A poetry collection and a short story — Serbian-English edition

  6. 2023.

    The Mirror

    A monodrama, in the anthology of monodramas for children “Poštovana publiko”

Free electronic stories

  • The cat who would not wash his paws 2020.
  • Snegurochka and the heart of snowflakes 2020.
  • The girl who met Pinocchio 2021.
  • The fairy and the suitcase Farče magazine, 2021.

Poetry in print magazines

  • Jedrenjak — Mala Laguna
  • Osmijeh — Association of Writers for Children and Young People of Montenegro
  • Teslarica — Association of Writers of Serbia
  • Stremljenja
  • Jedinstvo
  • Procvali božuri — Spiritual poetry for children, Institute for Children’s Literature
  • The “Kordun” Literary Workshop

Awards and recognitions

  • Tesla Spirit Award

    2022/23.

    A major award — a medal, a plaque and a certificate for the best children’s book about Nikola Tesla in the world.

  • Best children’s book in Montenegro

    2020/2021.

    Association of Writers for Children and Young People of Montenegro — for “The French Adventure”.

  • The “Lukijan Mušicki” award

    The Sunčani breg literary society, Belgrade — for the book “The Boy and the Fairy”.

  • One of the 8 best books in the region

    A nomination for the “Little Prince” award at the “Vezeni most” festival in Tuzla, Bosnia and Herzegovina.

  • Recognition for a contribution to children’s literature

    2024.

    The “Kordun” Literary Workshop and the “Esnaf” literary guild — for a contribution to the development of children’s literature at home and abroad.

From the interview

Serbian Times, Chicago

Tell me about Tesla, grandpa

I have been listening to stories about Nikola Tesla since my earliest childhood. To this day I remember the feeling of waiting for some secret marvel, when my grandfather and I found in the attic a small orange notebook belonging to his brother, who had studied electrical engineering in Belgrade. I did not understand his notes about the great inventor, but I insisted on finding out what it all meant — so my grandfather turned facts about the life and work of Nikola Tesla that meant nothing to me into stories and fairy tales. There were also our own fascinating experiments in my grandmother’s garden, among the peonies and the tulips.

Read the whole interview
“Student” magazine

You fall, you get up — but never, ever forget to get up!

Young people are a wonderful marvel who ought to be listened to, and heard — if I had not worked with so many children, my books would not be as warmly received as they are today.

Read the whole interview
RYL.rs

A long search for the truth

A conversation about roots, the family archive and how historical material becomes a story for children.

Read the whole interview
Filoblog of the Faculty of Philosophy in Niš

Luminaries of national philology XIX

I believe that my childhood and my surroundings shaped both my choice of studies and my calling in life. The answers about the fate of your ancestors are best sought in the study of national philology — especially in the history of the language, because the history of a people is reflected in it.

Read the whole interview
A flying sailing ship and a balloon above Paris — an illustration from the Maya Story world

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