Malcolm Charles Peet (5 October 1947 – 2 March 2015) was an English writer and illustrator best known for his young adult fiction. He won several honors, including the Brandford Boase, the Carnegie Medal, and the Guardian Prize, which are British children's literature awards recognizing the year's best books. Three of his novels feature football and the fictional South American sports journalist Paul Faustino. The Murdstone Trilogy (2014) and "Mr Godley's Phantom" were his first works aimed at adult readers.

Mal Peet grew up in North Norfolk and studied English and American Studies at the University of Warwick. Later, he moved to southwest England and worked a variety of jobs before turning full-time to writing and illustrating in the early 1990s. Alongside his wife, Elspeth Graham, he wrote and illustrated many educational picture books for young children, and his cartoons appeared in a number of magazines.