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Christopher Paul Curtis (born May 10, 1953) is an American children's book author. His first novel, The Watsons Go to Birmingham - 1963, was published in 1995 and brought him immediate national recognition, receiving the Coretta Scott King Honor Book Award and the Newbery Honor Book Award in addition to numerous other awards. In 2000, he became the first person to win both the Newbery Medal and the Coretta Scott King Award-prizes received for his second novel Bud, Not Buddy-and the first African-American man to win the Newbery Medal. His novel The Watsons Go to Birmingham - 1963 was made into a television film in 2013.

Curtis has written a total of eight novels and has penned introductions to several prominent books in addition to contributing articles to several newspapers and magazines. Following the success of his first two novels, he founded the Nobody but Curtis Foundation in an effort to improve literacy levels amongst children and young adults in North America and Africa.

Born and raised in Flint, Michigan, Curtis worked as an autoworker for General Motors for thirteen years following his high school graduation. During this time, he attended the University of Michigan-Flint as a part-time student, ultimately receiving his degree in 2000. Curtis is praised for his storytelling ability and his use of humor to discuss more serious topics of racism, poverty, and child abuse. His ability to authentically portray the experiences of children and share history in a way that encourages readers to learn more has made him a widely-taught author in elementary and middle schools.

Christopher Paul Curtis was born in Flint, Michigan, on May 10, 1953, the second child of five children. His father, Dr. Herman (Henry) Elmer Curtis, was a chiropodist who became a factory worker when his patients could no longer pay. Curtis's father was a union activist and the first black production foreman at the Fisher Body Plant. His mother, Leslie Jane Curtis, was a homemaker until her children got older. Then she became an educator in the Flint Public School System. Curtis attributes his love of books and reading to his mother and considers his parents a significant influence on his life. They were involved in the Civil Rights Movement and brought Curtis and his siblings to several NAACP marches. Curtis recalls picketing places in Flint with his parents that would not serve or hire black people in the early 1960s.

Curtis attended Dewey Elementary, Clark Elementary, Pierce Elementary (in the Academically Gifted Program), Whittier Junior High School, and McKinley Junior High School of the Flint Public School System.[citation needed ] In 1967, he was the first African-American student to be elected to the student council in the school's 32-year history.[citation needed ] In middle school, Curtis's favorite books were To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee and The Bridges at Toko-Ri by James A. Michener. Curtis also enjoyed reading Mad magazine, Sports Illustrated, Time magazine, and comic books while growing up. His parents valued reading and exposed Curtis and his siblings to a wide variety of books, taking them to the library every Saturday. However, in an interview with the New York Public Library, Curtis stated that, despite reading a lot, he found it difficult to connect to books and stories because they were not by or about black people like himself.

He graduated from Flint Southwestern High School in 1971. The summer after graduating from high school, Curtis became a member of a Lansing-based theatrical/musical group called Suitcase Theater which rehearsed on Tuesdays and Thursdays and performed musical numbers and the works of Langston Hughes. The group performed in the United States, Canada, and Europe.

After graduating high school, Curtis planned to pursue a political science degree at the University of Michigan-Flint. He attended classes full-time for a year but did not do well in his courses. Due to his poor performance in school and the competitive wage being offered at Flint's General Motors Fisher Body Plant No. 1, Curtis chose to work full-time at the factory on September 15, 1972. During this time, he continued taking classes at night as a part-time student. He graduated from the University of Michigan-Flint in 2000. While in college, Curtis took a black literature course that introduced him to authors like Alice Walker, Zora Neale Hurston, and Toni Morrison. Not only did this course foster his love for literature, but it also served as inspiration for details and descriptions in some of his novels.

Curtis spent 13 years after high school working on the assembly line of Flint's Fisher Body Plant No. 1. His job entailed hanging fifty- to eighty-pound car doors on Buicks for ten hours a day. It was physically demanding as well as monotonous labor. Christopher and his partner at the Plant worked out a deal where, instead of alternating hanging doors, one person would hang every door for thirty minutes while the other took a thirty-minute break. During his thirty-minute breaks, Curtis would block out the noise of the factory and find solace and refuge in reading and writing. Curtis recalls hating working in the factory, despite the steady wages and benefits, and even having nightmares about hanging car doors.

After quitting Fisher Body in 1985, he took a series of low-paying jobs. He worked as a groundskeeper at Stonegate Manor housing cooperative in Flint, served as the Flint campaign co-manager for United States Senator Donald Riegle in 1988, as a customer service representative for MichCon in Detroit, as a temporary worker for Manpower in Detroit, and as a warehouse clerk for Automated Data Processing in Allen Park, Michigan.

In 1993, Curtis, convinced by Kaysandra (Kay) Sookram, his wife at the time, took a year off of work to focus on his writing. During this year, Curtis took a writing course at the University of Michigan-Flint and entered several works into a contest for the Hopwood Awards. He received first place for both the novel he submitted, The Watsons Go to Florida, and an essay about his career in the auto factory. Following this win, Curtis submitted his novel to contests sponsored by publishing houses, ultimately resulting in the novel being selected by Delacorte Press for publication. Originally, Curtis intended for the story to center around the Watsons' trip to Florida in 1963, but when his son brought home Dudley Randall's poem " The Ballad of Birmingham," Curtis realized that Birmingham would be a more meaningful destination for the Watsons and changed the ending accordingly. In writing the novel, Curtis was also influenced by other literature and his personal experiences growing up in Flint. In his conversation with interviewer and State University of West Georgia Professor Peter E. Morgan, Curtis notes that he was inspired by Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God to personify Death from Kenny's perspective in The Watsons Go to Birmingham - 1963. In this same interview, Curtis describes his decision to leave out Kenny's relation to white people in despite his editor wanting to create a book that also appealed to white audiences. Curtis grew up in a self-contained Black neighborhood and recalls his lack of day-to-day interactions with races outside his own so he felt that Kenny would have a similar experience within his novel.

The novel was eventually published in 1995 as The Watsons Go to Birmingham - 1963. It was named to the American Library Association's list of Best Books for Young Adults and won both the Newbery Honor Book Award and the Coretta Scott King Honor Book Award alongside more than twenty-five other awards and honors. The Watsons sold over three hundred thousand copies and has been translated into eleven different languages. The movie rights to The Watsons were sold to Lancit Media shortly after publication and then bought by Whoopi Goldberg. The book was adapted for a television movie that aired on the Hallmark Channel in 2013.

Curtis's second book, Bud, Not Buddy, published in 1999, won the Newbery Medal and the Coretta Scott King Award in addition to numerous other awards. He based the story on that of his grandfather who, throughout the 1930s, traveled around Michigan with a band called Herman Curtis and the Dusky Devastators of The Depression.

In addition to writing novels, Curtis travels to various schools and communities to share his experience as an author. He has also written articles and reviews for newspapers and magazines across the country. He wrote an introduction for a reissue of Mark Twain's The Prince and the Pauper as well as an introduction for a reissue of Uncle Tom's Cabin.

Curtis also founded the Nobody but Curtis Foundation as a way to connect with young people and improve literacy levels across North America and Africa. He does this by sending educational materials, technology, and other supplies to schools in need as well as offering scholarships for students.

Writing process and style

His writing process involves waking up at 5 a.m. and editing his writing from the previous day in an effort to shape the words into a story. Following the editing, he goes to the library around 8 a.m. to write for the remainder of the morning. He spends his afternoons engaging in hobbies before spending the evenings writing again.

When he first moved to Windsor, Ontario he would write in the children's room of the Windsor Public Library. In an interview with Nancy Johnson and Cyndi Giorgis, he said that he chose to write here because he enjoyed the energy that kids provide and felt that the librarians were particularly wonderful. In fact, despite the library not officially opening until 10 a.m., the librarians allowed Curtis to come in early to write. Curtis eventually moved his writing to the University of Windsor library due to budget cuts at the Windsor Public Library.

Curtis writes all of his stories in longhand and tends to be an unstructured writer, choosing to follow the voices of his characters rather than outline a specific plot. He says that this method allows him to take time with each of his characters and slow down the writing process as a whole. He identifies Toni Morrison as one of his favorite authors because of the beauty of her language and her ability to write about difficult topics in an eloquent and expert manner. He also loves Mark Twain for his ability to create humor that has transcended generations. Curtis incorporates humor in all of his books, particularly as a way to balance the more serious and difficult topics he often writes about. He also seeks to foster intimacy and closeness with the reader by writing in the first person as opposed to the third person. Curtis did not intend to become a children's author and still does not consider himself one-he just writes stories he believes others would enjoy reading.

Curtis enjoys writing historical fiction because it provides a sense of reality and allows him to explore important stories that have not been told or widely taught to young readers. Through this writing, he hopes to help his readers recognize the importance of history and how it affects all people as well as encourage them to learn more about the historical events he includes in his novels. Additionally, many of Curtis's books are set in Flint as he tends to draw from his personal experiences growing up there.

His four rules to becoming a writer are: (1) Write every day, (2) Have fun with your writing, (3) Be patient with your writing, and (4) Ignore all rules.

Curtis met his first wife, Kay Sookram, while attending a basketball game in Hamilton, Ontario. Sookram was born and raised in Trinidad, but moved to Ontario to study nursing. While dating, Curtis and Sookram sent letters to each other. This was Sookram's first encounter with Curtis's writing. After getting married, Curtis moved to Windsor, Ontario to live with Kay because she was unable to get a U.S. work visa. They have two children together: Steven Darrell, born in 1978, and Cydney McKenzie, born in 1992.

Curtis and Sookram separated in the late 2000s. A few years later, Curtis married Habon Aden and they have two children together: Ayaan Leslie (2010) and Ebyaan Hothan (2012).

In his free time, he enjoys playing basketball and listening to music, primarily jazz and blues. He views both as a good way to release stress. He also enjoys reading, but only when he is not writing because otherwise, he finds his writing becomes significantly affected by the style of the author he is reading. According to an interview with The Washington Post, Curtis enjoys reading on the couch in the early morning.

The Watsons Go to Birmingham - 1963 (1995) - When Kenny Watson's older brother, Byron, gets to be too much trouble, the Watsons head from Flint, Michigan, to Birmingham, Alabama, to visit Grandma Sands, the one person who can shape Byron up. But the events that shake Birmingham in the summer of 1963 will change Kenny's life forever. The Watsons Go to Birmingham - 1963 was a runner-up for the Newbery Medal and was selected as a top book of the year by many publications and organizations. In 2013, it was named as one of the New York Public Library's 100 Great Children's Books of the Last 100 Years.

Bud, Not Buddy (1999) - It is 1936 in Flint, Michigan. Times may be hard, and ten-year-old Bud may be a motherless boy on the run, but he has a few things going for him. Bud goes to find who he believes is his father, a man named Herman E. Calloway. He meets a few friends on the way, and stays determined to achieve his goals. Curtis modeled characters in Bud, Not Buddy after his two grandfathers: Earl "Lefty" Lewis, a Negro league baseball pitcher, and Herman E. Curtis, leader of Herman Curtis and the Dusky Devastators during the Great Depression. Bud, Not Buddy won the 2000 Newbery Medal. It also won the Coretta Scott King Award, and was chosen as the best book of the year by the School Library Journal.

Bucking the Sarge (2004) - Luther T. Farrell has got to get out of Flint, Michigan. He just needs to escape the evil empire of the local slumlord, "The Sarge", aka his mother. Bucking the Sarge was selected as one of the best children's books of the year by various publications and organizations, including Publishers Weekly.

Mr. Chickee's Funny Money (2005) - Mr. Chickeesaw, the genial blind man in the neighborhood, gives 9-year-old Steven a mysterious bill with 15 zeros on it and the image of a familiar but startling face. Mr. Chickee's Funny Money was a Parents' Choice Award winner.

Mr. Chickee's Messy Mission (2007) - When Russell's dog, Rodney Rodent, jumps into a mural to chase a demonic-looking gnome and disappears, the Flint Future Detectives are on the case.

Elijah of Buxton (2007) - A story based on the historic settlement of North Buxton, Ontario, developed for and by former African-American slaves who escaped to Canada on the Underground Railroad. In Canada they were known as Negro refugees. Elijah of Buxton won the 2008 Coretta Scott King Award and the 2008 Scott O'Dell award for historical fiction for young adult. It was also named Booklist's "Top of the List" winner for "Youth Fiction."

The Mighty Miss Malone (2012) - This book is set in Depression-era Gary, Indiana, and Flint, Michigan. The work is a spin-off from Bud, Not Buddy.

The Madman of Piney Woods (October 2014) - This book returns readers to Buxton, Ontario, this time in 1901. It is told in alternating chapters, by two twelve-year-old boys. Alvin "Red" Stockard is an Irish boy living in nearby Chatham, Ontario, and Benjamin "Benji" Alston, is a Black Canadian boy who lives in the settlement of Buxton; he is a descendant of African-American slaves who reached freedom in Canada via the Underground Railroad. Several characters from Elijah of Buxton make brief appearances in this work.

The Journey of Little Charlie (January 2018) - The third book in Curtis's Buxton Trilogy, this begins on a plantation in South Carolina in 1858, where a 12-year-old boy helps the overseer recapture an escaped slave. He goes to Canada with a party trying to recapture a slave boy, and they are prevented by a resisting group of African Americans in Buxton. It was a finalist for the 2018 National Book Award for Young People's Literature.

Curtis also edited Bites: Scary Stories to Sink Your Teeth Into, a collection of scary children's stories published in 2010 by Scholastic.

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Christopher Paul Curtis (born May 10, 1953) is an American children's book author. His first novel, The Watsons Go to Birmingham - 1963 , was published in 1995 and brought him immediate national recognition, receiving the Coretta Scott King Honor Book Award and the Newbery Honor Book Award in addition to numerous other awards.

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I love my hair!, Tarpley, Natasha. | Gloria Coles Flint Public Library

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Young Gifted and Black: Meet 52 Black Heroes from Past and Present by Jamia Wilson

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Young Gifted and Black: Meet 52 Black Heroes from Past and Present by Jamia Wilson

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Young, gifted and black / Meet 52 Black Heroes from Past and Present, Wilson, Jamia | Gloria Coles Flint Public Library

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Me and My Mama by Carole Boston Weatherford (Ebook)

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Me and My Mama by Carole Boston Weatherford (Ebook)

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Me and My Mama, Weatherford, Carole Boston | Gloria Coles Flint Public Library

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Young Gifted and Black: Meet 52 Black Heroes from Past and Present by Jamia Wilson

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Young Gifted and Black: Meet 52 Black Heroes from Past and Present by Jamia Wilson

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Young, gifted and black / Meet 52 Black Heroes from Past and Present, Wilson, Jamia | Gloria Coles Flint Public Library

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Genesis begins again, Williams, Alicia, 1970- | Gloria Coles Flint Public Library

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Me and the Family Tree by Carole Boston Weatherford

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Me and the Family Tree by Carole Boston Weatherford

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Me and the family tree, Weatherford, Carole Boston, 1956- | Gloria Coles Flint Public Library

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Little Melba and her Big Trombone by Katheryn Russell-Brown

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Little Melba and her Big Trombone by Katheryn Russell-Brown

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Little Melba and her big trombone, Russell-Brown, Katheryn, 1961- | Gloria Coles Flint Public Library

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The Burning: Black Wall Street and the Tulsa Race Massacre of 1912 (Young Readers Edition) by Tim Madigan (Ebook or Audiobook)

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The Burning: Black Wall Street and the Tulsa Race Massacre of 1912 (Young Readers Edition) by Tim Madigan (Ebook or Audiobook)

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The Burning (Young Readers Edition), Madigan, Tim | Gloria Coles Flint Public Library

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We are here, Charles, Tami. | Gloria Coles Flint Public Library

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Standing in the Need of Prayer : A Modern Retelling of the Classic Spiritual by Carole Bostone Weatherford

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Standing in the Need of Prayer : A Modern Retelling of the Classic Spiritual by Carole Bostone Weatherford

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Standing in the need of prayer : a modern retelling of the classic spiritual, Weatherford, Carole Boston, 1956- | Gloria Coles Flint Public Library

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Legacy: Women Poets of the Harlem Renaissance by Nikki Grimes

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Legacy: Women Poets of the Harlem Renaissance by Nikki Grimes

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Legacy : women poets of the Harlem Renaissance, Grimes, Nikki. | Gloria Coles Flint Public Library

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Black Boy Black Boy: Celebrate the Power of YOU (Ebook)

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Black Boy Black Boy: Celebrate the Power of YOU (Ebook)

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Black Boy, Black Boy, Redmond, Jorge | Gloria Coles Flint Public Library

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Nothing Special, Cooper, Desiree | Gloria Coles Flint Public Library

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The Door of No Return by Kwame Alexander

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The Door of No Return by Kwame Alexander

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The door of no return, Alexander, Kwame. | Gloria Coles Flint Public Library

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We Wait for the Sun by Dovey Johnson Roundtree

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We Wait for the Sun by Dovey Johnson Roundtree

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We wait for the sun, Roundtree, Dovey Johnson, 1914-2018 | Gloria Coles Flint Public Library

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An American story, Alexander, Kwame. | Gloria Coles Flint Public Library

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When Winter Robeson Came by Brenda Woods

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When Winter Robeson Came by Brenda Woods

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When Winter Robeson came, Woods, Brenda (Brenda A.) | Gloria Coles Flint Public Library

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Hair story, Ramos, NoNieqa | Gloria Coles Flint Public Library

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Born on the water / Born on the Water, Hannah-Jones, Nikole | Gloria Coles Flint Public Library

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The Lucky Ones by Linda Williams Jackson

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The Lucky Ones by Linda Williams Jackson

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The lucky ones, Jackson, Linda Williams | Gloria Coles Flint Public Library

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Shirley Chisholm is a Verb! by Veronica Chambers

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Shirley Chisholm is a Verb! by Veronica Chambers

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Shirley Chisholm is a verb!, Chambers, Veronica. | Gloria Coles Flint Public Library

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My Selma: True Stories of a Southern Childhood at the Height of the Civil Rights Movement

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My Selma: True Stories of a Southern Childhood at the Height of the Civil Rights Movement

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My Selma : true stories of a Southern childhood at the height of the civil rights movement, Brown, Willie Mae | Gloria Coles Flint Public Library

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Opening the Road: Victory Hugo and his Green Book by Keila V. Dawson

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Opening the Road: Victory Hugo and his Green Book by Keila V. Dawson

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Opening the road : Victor Hugo Green and his green book, Dawson, Keila V. | Gloria Coles Flint Public Library

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Freedom on the Menu: The Greensboro Sit-Ins by Carole Boston Weatherford

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Freedom on the Menu: The Greensboro Sit-Ins by Carole Boston Weatherford

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Freedom on the menu : the Greensboro sit-ins, Weatherford, Carole Boston, 1956- | Gloria Coles Flint Public Library

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What was the Harlem Renaissance? by Sherri Smith

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What was the Harlem Renaissance? by Sherri Smith

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What was the Harlem Renaissance?, Smith, Sherri L. | Gloria Coles Flint Public Library

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Ways to Make Sunshine by Renee Watson (Series)

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Ways to Make Sunshine by Renee Watson (Series)

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Ways to make sunshine, Watson, Renée. | Flint Public Library

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Black boy joy | Flint Public Library

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Black girl magic / A Poem, Browne, Mahogany L. | Flint Public Library

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Tristan Strong Punches a Hole in the Sky by Kwame Mbalia (Series)

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Tristan Strong Punches a Hole in the Sky by Kwame Mbalia (Series)

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Tristan Strong punches a hole in the sky, Mbalia, Kwame | Flint Public Library

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Notable Works: The Blacker the Berry, A Dance like Starlight, and Max and the Tag-Along Moon

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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Floyd Cooper (January 8, 1956 - July 15, 2021) was an award-winning illustrator of children's books whose art frequently explored the African American experience. He was based in Easton, Pennsylvania, and worked with authors such as Jane Yolen, Nikki Grimes, Eloise Greenfield, Howard Bryant, Joyce Carol Thomas, and Bill Martin Jr, among others. In all, he illustrated more than 100 titles.

Floyd Donald Cooper Jr. was born in 1956 in Tulsa, Oklahoma, to Ramona (Williams) Cooper and Floyd Cooper Sr. His mother was a beautician while his father built houses. Floyd grew up in low income housing and attended 11 different elementary schools.

In school his teachers began to notice his illustrations and submitted his work to a scholarship committee. Floyd earned a scholarship to the University of Oklahoma, where he studied advertising. After graduating in 1978, Floyd worked for Hallmark Cards in Kansas City. He later moved to Manhattan where he struggled before he got his first contract with Penguin Books Floyd's first illustrated book was published in 1988 and written by Eloise Greenfield.

He married Velma Hyatt Cooper and they had two sons, Kai and Dayton. He died on July 15, 2021 in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, of cancer.

Cooper's artwork is known for using what he called an "oil erasure" subtractive technique, where he would "wash a board in oil paint and use a rubber eraser to methodically knead the paint away. He'd then create radiant images in soft, shimmering tones."

Floyd was awarded a Coretta Scott King Illustrator Award, for The Blacker the Berry a Coretta Scott King Award Illustrator Honor, a Golden Kite Award for A Dance Like Starlight: One Ballerina's Dream. and a Charlotte Zolotow Award for Max and the Tag-Along Moon written by Floyd himself. Laura Charlotte received a Parents' Choice Award and a School Library Journal Best Books citation.

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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Floyd Cooper (January 8, 1956 - July 15, 2021) was an award-winning illustrator of children's books whose art frequently explored the African American experience. He was based in Easton, Pennsylvania, and worked with authors such as Jane Yolen, Nikki Grimes, Eloise Greenfield, Howard Bryant, Joyce Carol Thomas, and Bill Martin Jr, among others.

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Jewell Parker Rhodes (born 1954 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania) is an American bestselling novelist and educator.

She is the author of several books for children including the New York Times bestsellers Black Brother, Black Brother and which has garnered over 50 awards and honors including The Walter Award, the Indies Choice/EB White Read-Aloud Award, and the Jane Addams Children's Book Award for Older Readers. Rhodes is also the author of Paradise on Fire (winner of the Green Earth Book Award), Towers Falling and the celebrated Louisiana Girls Trilogy, which includes Ninth Ward, winner of a Coretta Scott King Honor Award, Sugar, and Bayou Magic. Her novel Bayou Magic is featured in the third season of Apple TV+'s Emmy award-winning series Ghostwriter. Her latest novel for young readers, Treasure Island: Runaway Gold, releases in October 2023.

Rhodes has written six adult novels: Voodoo Dreams, Magic City, Douglass' Women, Season, Moon, and Hurricane, as well as the memoir Porch Stories: A Grandmother's Guide to Happiness, and two writing guides: Free Within Ourselves: Fiction Lessons for Black Authors and The African American Guide to Writing and Publishing Non-Fiction. A reissue of Magic City, a novel about the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre, was released in 2021 in recognition of the 100th anniversary.

Jewell is a regular speaker at colleges and conferences. The driving force behind all of Jewell's work is to inspire social justice, equity, and environmental stewardship.

Jewell is the Founding Artistic Director of the Virginia G. Piper Center for Creative Writing and Narrative Studies Professor and Virginia G. Piper Endowed Chair at Arizona State University. She was awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters from Carnegie-Mellon University.

Rhodes was born and raised in Manchester, a largely African-American neighborhood on the North Side of Pittsburgh. As a child, she was a voracious reader. She began college as a drama major, but switched to writing when she discovered African-American literature for the first time. She received a Bachelor of Arts in Drama Criticism, a Master of Arts in English, and a Doctor of Arts in English (Creative Writing) from Carnegie Mellon University.

Her work has been published in China, Korea, France, Germany, Italy, Canada, Turkey, and the United Kingdom and reproduced in audio and for NPR's "Selected Shorts." She has been a featured speaker at the Runnymede International Literary Festival (University of London-Royal Holloway), Santa Barbara Writers Conference, Creative Nonfiction Writers Conference and Warwick University, among others.

Her recent fiction and essays have been anthologized in Rise Up Singing: Black Women Writers on Motherhood (ed., Berry), In Fact: The Best of Creative Nonfiction (ed. Gutkind), Gumbo (ed., Golden and Harris), and Children of the Night: Best Short Stories By Black Writers (ed., Naylor), along with others.

Many of Rhodes's middle grade novels focus on issues surrounding social justice within black communities throughout history and current events with themes of community. In particular, Ghost Boys, focuses on the racial injustices that pertain to the past and present with the main character experiencing police brutality and connecting with past . Rhodes's work promotes all people within a community to work together with collaborative, respectful, and empathetic manner, thus demonstrating how young readers start to self-reflect, seek information, and take action.

Middle Grade novels

Adult novels

Nonfiction

Free Within Ourselves: Fiction Lessons for Black Authors (1999)

The African American Guide to Writing and Publishing Non-Fiction (2001)

Porch Stories: A Grandmother's Guide to Happiness (2006)

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Jewell Parker Rhodes (born 1954 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania) is an American bestselling novelist and educator. She is the author of several books for children including the New York Times bestsellers Black Brother, Black Brother and which has garnered over 50 awards and honors including The Walter Award, the Indies Choice/EB White Read-Aloud Award, and the Jane Addams Children's Book Award for Older Readers.

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Notable Works: Rosa Parks & Claudette Colvin: Civil Rights Heroes, The Totally Gross History of Ancient Egypt, and The Crash (a Minecraft Novel)

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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Rita Williams-Garcia (born 1957) is an American writer of novels for children and young adults . In 2010, her young adult novel Jumped was a National Book Award finalist for Young People's Literature. She won the 2011 Newbery Honor Award, Coretta Scott King Award, and Scott O'Dell Award for Historical Fiction for her book One Crazy Summer. She won the PEN/Norma Klein Award. Her 2013 book, P.S. Be Eleven, was a Junior Literary Guild selection, a New York Times Editors Choice Book, and won the Coretta Scott King Award in 2014. In 2016 her book Gone Crazy in Alabama won the Coretta Scott King Award. In 2017, her book Clayton Byrd Goes Underground was a finalist for the National Book Award for young people's literature.

Williams-Garcia was born in Queens, New York. Her father was in the military. She graduated from Hofstra University in 1980, where she studied with Richard Price and Sonya Pilcer. She lives in Jamaica, New York. She taught for many years at Vermont College of Fine Arts.

Blue Tights, Lodestar Books, 1988, ISBN 978-0-525-67234-0

Fast Talk on a Slow Track, Dutton, 1991, ISBN 978-0-525-67334-7; reprint, Paw Prints, 2008, ISBN 978-1-4352-7952-0

Like Sisters on the Homefront, Lodestar Books, 1995, ISBN 978-0-525-67465-8; reprint, Paw Prints, 2008, ISBN 978-1-4352-4403-0

Every Time a Rainbow Dies. HarperCollins Publishers. 2001. ISBN 978-0-06-029202-7.; reprint, HarperCollins, 2002, ISBN 978-0-06-447303-3

; reprint HarperCollins, 2007, ISBN 978-0-06-440992-6

; reprint, HarperCollins, 2010, ISBN 978-0-06-076093-9

Gone Crazy in Alabama, 2015

Bottle Cap Boys: Dancing on Royal Street, 2015

Clayton Byrd Goes Underground, 2017

A Sitting in St. James, published in May 2021 by Quill Tree Books, an imprint of HarperCollins Children's Books, ISBN 0062367293

"Warning: Characters May Appear As They Are or Why I Write Realistic Fiction", Hunger Mountain

"Author Interview: Rita Williams-Garcia on Jumped", Cynsations, March 27, 2009

"Learning About Rita Williams-Garcia", Rutgers

Mélina Mangal, Rita Williams-Garcia, Mitchell Lane Publishers, 2003, ISBN 978-1-58415-217-0

Rita Williams-Garcia at Library of Congress, with 10 library catalog records

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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Rita Williams-Garcia (born 1957) is an American writer of novels for children and young adults . In 2010, her young adult novel Jumped was a National Book Award finalist for Young People's Literature.

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Jason Reynolds (born December 6, 1983) is an American author of novels and poetry for young adult and middle-grade audience. Born in Washington, D.C., and raised in neighboring Oxon Hill, Maryland, Reynolds found inspiration in rap and had an early focus on poetry, publishing several poetry collections before his first novel in 2014, When I Was The Greatest, which won the John Steptoe Award for New Talent.

In the next four years, Reynolds wrote eight more novels, most notably the New York Times best-selling Track series- (2016), Patina (2017), Sunny (2018), Lu (2018)-and As Brave As You (2016). Ghost was a National Book Award Finalist for Young People's Literature and As Brave As You won the Kirkus Prize, the NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literary Work for Youth/Teen, and the Schneider Family Book Award. Reynolds also wrote a Marvel Comics novel called Miles Morales: Spider-Man (2017).

In 2017, Reynolds returned to poetry with Long Way Down, a novel in verse that was named a Newbery Honor book, a Printz Honor Book, and best young adult work by the Mystery Writers of America's Edgar Awards. In 2019, he wrote Look Both Ways, for which he won a Carnegie Medal.

Reynolds was named as the Library of Congress' national ambassador for young people's literature in January 2020.

Early life, education and influences

Reynolds was born on December 6, 1983, in Washington, DC, and grew up just across Maryland border in Oxon Hill, a neighborhood where his mother, a special education teacher in a Maryland public school, could afford a house with a yard and enough space for Reynolds, his three siblings, and sometimes other extended family.

At nine years old, Reynolds was inspired by Queen Latifah's third album,Black Reign, to start writing poetry. Outside of her rap, few literary works spoke to his experience of urban life growing up as a black child and then teenager in the 1980s and 1990s, and he didn't start reading books until he was 17. In the meantime, Tupac and Biggie also formed major influences.

One of Reynolds's earliest poems dealt with his grandmother's death in 1994 when he was 10. He wrote a few lines in an effort to console his mother, who printed the poem on the program for the funeral, and after that Reynolds wrote poems as each of his grandmother's siblings passed. Moved by these experiences of "the power of language", he continued to pursue poetry through high school, graduating from Bishop McNamara High School in 2000, and college, even as he received poor grades and discouragement from professors in his English courses at the University of Maryland (he ultimately graduated with a BA in English.)

While an undergraduate, Reynolds met collaborator Jason Griffin, who became his roommate. Reynolds was also introduced to spoken word in this period and began performing, including eventually solo shows, and in 2001, his first book came out, a poetry collection called Let Me Speak.

During college, Reynolds also worked at a DC bookstore chain called Karibu Books, which specialized in African-American literature. At Karibu he encountered prose that resonated with him for the first time, such as Richard Wright's novel Black Boy. Enthralled with Wright's novel from the first page, Reynolds next began making his way through the great works of African-American literature on the store's shelves, reading James Baldwin, Zora Neale Hurston, and Toni Morrison. While at Karibu he also encountered street fiction, also known as urban fiction, which is a literary genre Reynolds compares to rap's capacity for being "raw and honest. For some kids, this was their life."

Reynolds moved back to Washington, D.C., from Brooklyn in 2016. He collects items related to African-American literature, including a letter by Langston Hughes, a pre-publication review copy of Claude Brown's Manchild in the Promised Land and an autographed first edition copy of Toni Morrison's . He appeared on Antiques Roadshow in 2021 to discuss his collecting.

Reynolds does not start with a particular age audience in mind; instead he focuses on trying to write the voice of his characters authentically and lets that dictate whom the book would appeal to. All of his writings feature minority characters, which he sees as a reflection of the modern world.

Early works

After graduating from college, Reynolds moved to New York with a classmate, Jason Griffin; in 2005, the pair self-published a collaboration, collecting Griffin's visual art and Reynolds's poetry, called SELF. The book earned the pair an agent and then a book contract. Four years later they published My Name Is Jason. Mine Too.: Our Story. Our Way, a memoir about moving to New York to pursue their dreams, expressed through Reynolds's poetry and Griffin's illustrations. They published the book with the HarperTeen imprint of HarperCollins, working with editor Joanna Cotler (after Cotler retired, she referred him to Caitlin Dlouhy, who would become the editor on his next seven books). In the meantime, Reynolds moved home to DC in 2008 after losing his apartment in New York. He worked at a department store-the Lord & Taylor in North Bethesda, Maryland-to pay the bills, going to a Border's bookstore on his lunch break to see his book arrive on the shelf in 2009. Next, he became a caseworker in a mental health clinic his father directed.

Eventually, Reynolds returned to New York, again working in retail while he applied to graduate school, unsuccessfully because of his college grades. Nevertheless, he began writing a young adult novel-"often while standing at the cash register when business was slow" at the Rag & Bone store he managed-spurred by his friend Chris Myers, son of Walter Dean Myers and himself an author and illustrator. Reynolds had told Chris he had basically stopped writing, but Chris pointed out that with his father aging (the elder Myers died in 2014), there would soon be a shortage of new works written about young black children, particularly black boys. He suggested Reynolds look at some of his father's old works, and The Young Landlords particularly connected with Reynolds; the work gave Reynolds the confidence to "write in my voice, use my tongue, my language, my style, and write a story. Before that I always felt like I wasn't good enough because I wasn't Baldwin, or Toni Mor, or Richard Wright", but after reading Myers's work, "the floodgates were opened."

In 2014, Reynolds published When I Was The Greatest (with the Atheneum of Simon & Schuster), a young adult novel set in Reynolds' own neighborhood of Bedford-Stuyvesant. For the work, Reynolds won the 2015 Coretta Scott King/ John Steptoe Award for New Talent from the American Library Association.

In 2015, Reynolds published The Boy in the Black Suit, about a child grieving the loss of his mother. It won a Coretta Scott King Honor from the American Library Association.

Also in 2015, Reynolds published All American Boys, co-authored with Brendan Kiely. The book depicts a black teenager assaulted in a convenience store by a white police officer who wrongly suspects him of stealing. The book is written in two voices, with Reynolds writing from the point of view of the teenaged victim, Rashad Butler, in a hospital bed, while Kiely wrote the character Quinn Collins, a white teenager and family friend of the police officer, who witnessed the violent attack. In a review for The New York Times, Kelka Magoon found both main characters "successfully drawn" and called the novel "a book to be grappled with, challenged by, and discussed. All American Boys represents one voice-even better, two voices-in a national conversation that must continue beyond its pages."

The book arose from personal conversations between Reynolds, who is black, and Kiely, who is white. The two met on a Simon & Schuster book tour in 2013, which coincided with the news that George Zimmerman had been acquitted of the murder of Trayvon Martin. Though strangers, Reynolds and Kiely began to share their feelings, each finding the other was "as frustrated as angry and as confused as I was", as Reynolds put it. A friendship developed and the conversations continued with increasing urgency; after a white police officer shot and killed Michael Brown, Kiely reached out to Reynolds to propose they write a book addressing police brutality and racial profiling.

The book won the inaugural Walter Dean Myers Award from the We Need Diverse Books organization, as well as a Coretta Scott King Honor.

In 2016, Reynolds published As Brave As You, which won the 2016 Kirkus Prize, the 2017 NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literary Work for Youth/Teen, the 2017 Schneider Family Book Award, and the 2017 Coretta Scott King Honor. The book describes two African-American brothers from Brooklyn who are sent to spend the summer with their grandfather in Virginia. In The Washington Post, a reviewer said, "Reynolds deftly blends humor and heart through lively dialogue and spot-on sibling dynamics."

The Track series follows a different protagonist in each novel, all of whom are members of the Defenders, an elite track team. In 2016, Reynolds published , a National Book Award Finalist for Young People's Literature. Reviewing Ghost in The New York Times, Kate Messner said that in his title character, Reynolds has created a protagonist "whose journey is so genuine that he's worthy of a place alongside Ramona and Joey Pigza on the bookshelves where our most beloved, imperfect characters live." Ghost was published by the Caitlyn Dlouhy imprint of Atheneum on August 30, 2016.

Three more books have followed in the series. Patina (2017) depicts another young star runner, Patina "Patty" Jones. Patty feels out of place at her nearly all-white private school. Patty and her younger sister live with their dead father's brother and his white wife because their birth mother is unable to take care of them after losing her legs due to diabetes. Critics noted the deft way the book handles many issues including teamwork and non-traditional family structures. This was the first book Reynolds had written with a female point of view. Reynolds wanted to write about the special burdens some teen girls assume in their families. In his New York Times review, Tom Rinaldi called the novel "excellent". The book was also well received by other reviewers, earning a starred review in Kirkus Reviews, School Library Journal, Horn Book Magazine, and Booklist.

The third installment in the series, called Sunny, was released on April 10, 2018. magazine named the audiobook, narrated by Guy Lockard, one of the 13 best of 2018 to date, saying, "The whole series is a must-listen, but Sunny is a particular treat" thanks to the Lockard's portrayal of the "lolling, goofball voice" of the novel's first-person protagonist.

The fourth installment in the series, called Lu, was released October 23, 2018.

Reynolds is the author of Miles Morales: Spider-Man (2017), a novel based on the Marvel Comics' Afro-Puerto Rican teen character. Reynolds has described his ambitions for the book as similar to Jordan Peele's approach to , namely to engage the audience with systemic social issues by "distill[ing] it down to a single family." Speaking to School Library Journal, Reynolds said, "It was a trip to take these issues I care so much about and figure out what they look like as a person. What do they sound like? How do they dress? How do they act? What do they do?" Reviewing the book for the Washington City Paper, Kayla Randall said, "The result...was exceptional."

Reynolds's 2017 book, Long Way Down, is a novel written in verse. It describes a 15-year-old who sees his brother shot to death, drawing on Reynolds's experience of having a friend murdered when Reynolds was 19. Reynolds was moved to write the book by his visits to juvenile detention centers, where he frequently encounters children caught in a cycle of violence that, under slightly different circumstances, might have been his own: Reynolds has said that after his own friend's murder, he and other friends planned to seek revenge but never did so as the perpetrator wasn't conclusively identified, something he looked back on and "realized how lucky that was." Long Way Down was named a 2018 Newbery Honor book by the American Library Association, a Printz Honor Book, best young adult work at the Mystery Writers of America's Edgar Awards, a Walter Dean Myers Award from the We Need Diverse Books organization, a Coretta Scott King Honor, and a finalist for the NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literary Work for Youth/Teens. An adaptation by Martine Kei Green-Rogers of Long Way Down was commissioned by the Kennedy Center and performed at the Kennedy Center's Family Theater in October/November 2018.

In October 2020, a graphic novel addition of Long Way Down was published with art by Danica Novgorodoff.

Reynolds and psychologist Manfred Günther, Library Festival Berlin 2018

On April 10, 2018, Reynolds released For Every One, a work of poetry. He originally performed the poem at the unveiling of the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial at the Kennedy Center. Two weeks later, Reynolds occupied three slots on The New York Times best-seller lists for children's literature: two on the young adult hardcover list ( Long Way Down and For Every One), and one on the children's series list for the Track series.

"Ten Things I've Been Meaning to Say to You"

Reynolds published a list for teenagers with 10 things he thought they should know about life and their futures. It was posted on May 28, 2018, on Powell's Book Blog.

Look Both Ways was published on October 8, 2019. The story is told across ten blocks in different perspectives as middle schoolers walk home from school. On the day of its release, Look Both Ways became a finalist for the National Book Award and later made the New York Times Best Sellers List. Jason Reynolds explained that he wanted to explore kids' autonomy in this book, saying, "It is a time when they are unsupervised" and they "get to learn about the world on their own, for better or for worse." He won the 2021 Carnegie Medal for the book.

Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You

Reynolds at the National Book Festival in 2022

Reynolds announced Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You in August 2019 in collaboration with Ibram X. Kendi. Releasing in March 2020, Reynolds' book is an adaptation of Kendi's book Stamped from the Beginning, which won the National Book Award in 2016. The book is for teens and young adults and serves to start a conversation among them about race and racism in America. Reynolds says, "I think that we have a rare opportunity to give the historical context of how we made it here today. This is the definitive history of race in America from the 1400s to today. It isn't about how to fix it per se. It's just about contextualizing why it is the way it is."

In 2021, Reynolds, alongside Kendi and Sonja Cherry-Paul, published Stamped (For Kids): Racism, Antiracism, and You, which was illustrated by Rachelle Baker. The book is a New York Times best seller.

Tomi Adeyemi, 21st-century African-American young adult novelist

Eve Ewing, 21st-century African-American poet and scholar of education

Ronald L. Smith, 21st-century African-American children's book author

Javaka Steptoe, 21st-century African-American children's book author and illustrator

Angie Thomas, 21st-century African-American young adult novelist

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Jason Reynolds (born December 6, 1983) is an American author of novels and poetry for young adult and middle-grade audience. Born in Washington, D.C., and raised in neighboring Oxon Hill, Maryland, Reynolds found inspiration in rap and had an early focus on poetry, publishing several poetry collections before his first novel in 2014, When I Was The Greatest, which won the John Steptoe Award for New Talent.

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Kwame Alexander (born August 21, 1968) is an American writer of poetry and children's fiction.

Alexander was born in Manhattan, New York, and grew up in Virginia. His father was a scholar and book publisher and his mother was an educator so he was always surrounded by books.

Alexander attended Virginia Tech, where he began premedical studies before taking a writing class with award-winning poet Nikki Giovanni.

Alexander's picture book Acoustic Rooster and His Barnyard Band was selected for the 2014 "Michigan Reads! One State, One Children's Book" program. He won a 2020 Newbery Honor for his illustrated poem The Undefeated.

Alexander runs the Bookinaday program to introduce children to writing and publishing. He is a regular contributor to National Public Radio's Morning Edition program.

The Door of No Return, a historical verse novel set in Ghana in 1861, told from the perspective of 11-year-old Koffi, was inspired by Alexander's visits to Ghana.

Alexander has received many awards as a writer, among them the 2017 Pat Conroy Legacy Award (an award that honors the example of acclaimed author Pat Conroy and recognizes writers who have achieved a lasting impact on their literary community), and his verse novel The Crossover won the 2015 Newbery Medal and was selected as an Honor book for the Coretta Scott King Award.

In 2016, Booked was named one of the best books of the year by Kirkus Reviews.

In 2017, Out of Wonder was named one of the best books of the year by Kirkus Reviews

The same year, Solo was named one of the best books of the year by Kirkus Reviews.

In 2018, Rebound was named one of the best books of the year by

In 2019, The Undefeated was named one of the best books of the year by Kirkus Reviews and The Horn Book Magazine.

In 2020, Becoming Mohammed Ali was named one of the best books of the year by

In 2022, The Door of No Return was named one of the best books of the year by Kirkus Reviews, The Horn Book Magazine, and Shelf Awareness.

Tough Love: Cultural Criticism and Familial Observations on the Life and Death of Tupac Shakur, ed. (1996)

Do the Write Thing (2002) (with Nina Foxx)

Kwame Alexander's Page-to-Stage Writing Workshop (2016)

Picture books

Acoustic Rooster and His Barnyard Band (2011)

Indigo Blume and the Garden City (2012)

Little Boys Soar (2014)

Surf's Up (2016)

How to Read a Book (2019), illustrated by Melissa Sweet

The Undefeated (2019), illustrated by Kadir Nelson

An American Story (2023). Published in the UK as Unspoken (2023)

The Flow: New Black Poets in Motion, ed. (1994)

Just Us: Poems & Counterpoems, 1986-1995 (1995)

360°: A Revolution of Black Poets, ed. (1998)

Kupenda: Love Poems (2000)

Dancing Naked on the Floor: poems and essays (2005)

The Way I Walk: short stories and poems for Young Adults, ed. (2006)

Crush: Love Poems (2007)

Family Pictures: Poems and Photographs Celebrating Our Loved Ones, ed. (2007)

An American Poem (2008)

And Then You Know: New and Selected Poems (2008)

The Book Party (2016)

The Playbook: 52 Rules to Aim, Shoot, and Score into in This Game Called Life (2017)

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Kwame Alexander (born August 21, 1968) is an American writer of poetry and children's fiction. Alexander was born in Manhattan, New York, and grew up in Virginia. His father was a scholar and book publisher and his mother was an educator so he was always surrounded by books.

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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Andrea Davis Pinkney (born 1963) is the author of numerous books for children and young adults, including picture books, novels, works of historical fiction and nonfiction who writes about African-American culture. In addition to her work as an author, Pinkney has had a career as a children's book publisher and editor, including as founder of the Jump at the Sun imprint at Hyperion Books for Children, the Disney Book Group (now Disney Publishing Worldwide). She is vice president and editor-at-large for Scholastic Trade Books.

Her books have won the Coretta Scott King Award and been a Coretta Scott King Honor book, have been ALA Notable Books five times, School Library Journal best books three times, New York Times Editor's Choice and Notable books, and more.

Pinkney is a graduate of Syracuse University's Newhouse School of Public Communications and is a former member of the Newhouse School's Board of Trustees. She lives in New York City with her husband, award-winning illustrator Brian Pinkney, and their two children.

Andrea Davis was born September 25, 1963, in Washington D.C. and was raised in Connecticut. Her parents were involved in the civil rights movement and exposed her to the cause from early on, even taking her to the annual conference of the National Urban League during many of her summer vacations.[citation needed ]

Pinkney graduated from Syracuse University in 1985 with a degree in journalism and began working as an editor at Mechanix Illustrated. She then went on to work as a senior editor at , as well as an editor for the book publishers Simon & Schuster and Scholastic.[citation needed ]

While working at one of these early editing jobs, she met Brian Pinkney, a Caldecott Honor-winning children's book illustrator, whom she later married. The two have collaborated on a number of books, including Sit In: How Four Friends Stood Up By Sitting Down, Duke Ellington, Seven Candles for Kwanzaa, and Dear Benjamin Banneker.[citation needed ]

She was chosen to deliver the 2014 May Hill Arbuthnot Lecture at the University of Minnesota Libraries, Children's Literature Research Collections, Saturday, May 3, 2014, from 7:00 PM to 9:00 PM (CDT). She was cited in January 2013 for "significant contributions to literature for young people provided through a body of work that brings a deeper understanding of African American heritage".

She currently lives in Brooklyn, New York.

Duke Ellington: The Piano Prince and His Orchestra

Ella Fitzgerald - illustrated by Brian Pinkney

Sit in: How Four Friends Stood up by Sitting Down; illustrated by Brian Pinkney

Because of You John Lewis: The True Story of a Remarkable Friendship; illustrated by Keith Henry Brown

A Poem for Peter: The Story of Ezra Jack Keats and the Creation of The Snowy Day; illustrated by Steve Johnson and Lou Fancher

Sojourner Truth's Step Stomp Stride - illustrated by Brian Pinkney

Seven Candles for Kwanzaa; illustrated by Brian Pinkney

Alvin Ailey; illustrated by Brian Pinkney

And She Was Loved: Toni Morrison's Life in Stories ; illustrated by Daniel Minter

Boycott Blues: How Rosa Parks Inspired a Nation; illustrated by Brian Pinkney

Martin & Mahalia: His Words, Her Song; illustrated by Brian Pinkney

Dear Benjamin Banneker; illustrated by Brian Pinkney

Bill Pickett Rodeo Ridin' Cowboy; illustrated by Brian Pinkney

Mims Christmas Jam; illustrated by Brian Pinkney

Fishing Day; illustrated by Shane Evans

Peggony Po; illustrated by Brian Pinkney

Sleeping Cutie; illustrated by Brian Pinkney

Hand in Hand: 10 Black Men Who Changed America; illustrated by Brian Pinkney

Let it Shine: Stories of Black Women Freedom Fighters; illustrated by Stephen Alcorn

Martin Rising: Requiem for a King; illustrated by Brian Pinkney

Rhythm Ride: a Road Trip through the Motown Sound

Ten9Eight: Teen Business Blasts Off

Stay True: Short Stories for Strong Girls

Birthday Wishes

100 Reasons to Love Reading

The George Arents Award (Syracuse University's highest alumni honor, presented annually to alumni who have made outstanding contributions to their chosen fields)

Medgar Evers College Lifetime Achievement Award

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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Andrea Davis Pinkney (born 1963) is the author of numerous books for children and young adults, including picture books, novels, works of historical fiction and nonfiction who writes about African-American culture.

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Jerry Pinkney (December 22, 1939 - October 20, 2021) was an American illustrator and writer of children's literature. Pinkney illustrated over 100 books since 1964, including picture books, nonfiction titles and novels. Pinkney's works addressed diverse themes and were usually done in watercolors.

In 1994, Pinkney obtained the Boston Globe-Horn Book Award for the book and he has received five Coretta Scott King Awards for illustration. In 2010, he received the Caldecott Medal for his book The Lion & the Mouse. His book A Place to Land: Martin Luther King Jr. and the Speech that Inspired a Nation (2019), illustrated by Pinkney and written by Barry Wittenstein, won the Orbis Pictus Award for 2020.

In 2000, Pinkney received the Virginia Hamilton Literary Award from Kent State University, and, in 2004, he was awarded the University of Southern Mississippi Medallion for outstanding contributions in the field of children's literature. In 2016, Pinkney received the Coretta Scott King - Virginia Hamilton Award for Lifetime Achievement.

Pinkney has partnered with the United States Postal Service, National Park Service, and National Geographic for his illustration work. His art has also been featured in numerous exhibitions.

Pinkney was born in Philadelphia on December 22, 1939, to Williemae and James Pinkney. Pinkney was the middle child in a family of five siblings. Pinkney struggled in school due to dyslexia, but excelled at drawing, even at the young age of 4. During Pinkney's youth, his mother encouraged him to develop his skills by enrolling him in art classes, but Pinkney's father did not consider art a sustainable career until Pinkney grew older.

Pinkney at the 2019 Texas Book Festival

During his early teens, Pinkney worked at a local newspaper stand, where he would pass the time by drawing city life. Pinkney's talent caught the eye of customer and cartoonist John Liney, who worked on the Henry comic strips. Liney showed Pinkney how artistry could be used for commercial purposes.

Pinkney attended the Murrell Dobbins Vocational High School for his secondary education and met his future wife, Gloria Jean Pinkney, during this time. Pinkney graduated from Murrell Dobbins in 1957 and was granted a full scholarship to the Philadelphia Museum College of Art (now University of the Arts). Pinkney only attended the Philadelphia College of Art for a few years, leaving to start a family with wife Gloria.

In 1960, Pinkney began working for The Rust Craft Greeting Card Company in Dedham, Massachusetts. Pinkney later worked at Barker-Black Studio, where he illustrated his first picture book in collaboration with Joyce Cooper Arkhurst called, The Adventures of Spider: West African Folk Tales (1964). He, along with two other artists, opened Kaleidoscope Studio a few years later. Pinkney opened his own freelance studio, Jerry Pinkney Studios, in 1968.

During the 1970s, Pinkney worked on the Black Heritage Stamp Series for the United States Postal Service. During the 1980s Pinkney began to receive additional recognition for his work, including a Coretta Scott King Award for his collaboration with author Patricia McKissack on Mirandy and Brother Wind (1989). Pinkney also collaborated with the National Geographic Magazine and the National Park Service on the topic of the Underground Railroad.

Pinkney also worked as an educator, teaching at colleges and universities like the University of Delaware, the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, New York and the University at Buffalo, in Buffalo, New York.

Pinkney's work was included in the 2015 exhibition We Speak: Black Artists in Philadelphia, 1920s-1970s at the Woodmere Art Museum.

Professional memberships

Jerry Pinkney and Gloria Jean Pinkney have four children: Troy, Brian, Scott, and Myles. Brian Pinkney and his wife Andrea Davis Pinkney also write books for children. The other Pinkney children, including Jerry and Gloria Pinkney's six grandchildren, all participate in the arts, which Gloria calls a continuation of "the Pinkney tradition."

Pinkney lived in Croton-on-Hudson in New York with his wife Gloria, where he worked out of his freelance studio, Jerry Pinkney Studio, since 1971.

Pinkney died of a heart attack on October 20, 2021, in Sleepy Hollow, New York, at the age of 81.

Pinkney got his start drawing in pencil and his early works were black and white productions. Pinkney used a combination of watercolors and pencils for the majority of his work, along with other materials, such as, "pastel[s], color pencils, and Cray-Pas". In an interview, he stated watercolors are his "medium of choice." Pinkney's "intricate detail" is considered "rare" for a person who uses watercolors.

Pinkney researched the subjects of his works for accuracy, such as the dress of the characters involved and the time periods. Pinkney also used live models for establishing character poses. Pinkney has stated he liked to draw animals the most and to give these characters human features.

Many of Pinkney's titles are on diverse themes and topics, such as African American history, and Pinkney has stated his stories are a way for him to "revisit" his childhood. His recent book, A Place to Land: Martin Luther King Jr and the Speech That Inspired a Nation (2019), portrays Martin Luther King Jr.'s 1963 March on Washington "I Have A Dream" speech.

A number of Pinkney's works retell Aesop Fables, such as The Grasshopper & The Ants (2015) and The Lion and the Mouse (2009).

Children's books

2010-2019

2020-2021

Pinkney, Jerry. The Little Mermaid. New York, Little, Brown Books for Young Readers, 2020.

Wells, Rosemary. The Welcome Chair. Illustrated by Jerry Pinkney. New York, Simon and Schuster, 2021.

Building Bridges: The Life and Times of Jerry Pinkney. 2004.

Pinkney has received many awards for his work as an illustrator over the years and has been recognized by multiple organizations for his contributions as an artist.

In 2000, Kent State University awarded Pinkney the Virginia Hamilton Literary Award, which honors creators of "multicultural literature" for youth.

1994, Fall: Featured in the Richard C. von Hess Illustration Gallery at the Philadelphia University of the Arts.

2000: Jerry Pinkney/ Brian Pinkney: Father & Son, hosted by the National Center for Children's Illustrated Literature in Texas.

2008, Fall/Winter: Featured in the Richard C. von Hess Illustration Gallery at the Philadelphia University of the Arts.

2010: Jerry Pinkney's African-American Journey to Freedom, featured in the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture.

2012: Witness: The Art of Jerry Pinkney, hosted by the Hudson River Museum in Yonkers, New York.

2013: Drawing on the Reverse Side: The Art and Life of Jerry Pinkney, displayed by Free Library of Philadelphia.

2016: Jerry Pinkney: Imaginings/An Artist's Explorations of Images and Words, featured by the Norman Rockwell Museum.

2017: The Storybook Magic of Jerry Pinkney, displayed by the Woodmere Art Museum in Philadelphia.

2019: Freedom's Journal: The Art of Jerry Pinkney, featured by the Woodmere Art Museum in Philadelphia.

In 1977, the United States Postal Service commissioned Pinkney to create the first stamp of the Black Heritage postage stamp series, a series honoring prolific African Americans in United States history. Pinkney completed a total of eleven portraits for the series, and his designs featured images of Harriet Tubman, Martin Luther King Jr., Benjamin Banneker, Whitney Young, Jackie Robinson, Scott Joplin, Carter Woodson, Mary McLeod Bethune and Sojourner Truth.

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Jerry Pinkney (December 22, 1939 - October 20, 2021) was an American illustrator and writer of children's literature. Pinkney illustrated over 100 books since 1964, including picture books, nonfiction titles and novels. Pinkney's works addressed diverse themes and were usually done in watercolors.

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Ashley Frederick Bryan (July 13, 1923 - February 4, 2022) was an American writer and illustrator of children's books. Most of his subjects are from the African-American experience. He was U.S. nominee for the Hans Christian Andersen Award in 2006 and he won the Laura Ingalls Wilder Award for his contribution to American children's literature in 2009. His picture book Freedom Over Me was short-listed for the 2016 Kirkus Prize and received a Newbery Honor.

Ashley Frederick Bryan was born on July 13, 1923, in Harlem and raised in the Bronx, both in New York City. His father worked as a printer of greeting cards and loved birds, and Bryan remembered their apartment as full of a hundred birds. He was born the second of six children and grew up with his three cousins. Bryan recalled his childhood in New York City during the 1930s as an idyllic time, full of art and music. He learned to draw, paint, and play instruments at school from artists and musicians participating in the Work Projects Administration program. With books he checked out from the library, Bryan made his own, temporary collection at home. He particularly enjoyed poetry, folktales, and fairy tales; stories that could be told within a brief span of pages.

Bryan attended the Cooper Union Art School, the only African-American student at that time. He had applied to other schools who had rejected him on the basis of race, but Cooper Union administered its scholarships in a blind test.

At the age of nineteen, World War II interrupted his studies. He was drafted into the U.S. Army and assigned to serve in a segregated unit as a member of a Port Battalion, landing at Omaha Beach on D-Day. He was so ill-suited to this work that his fellow soldiers often encouraged him to step aside and draw. He always kept a sketch pad in his gas mask. His book, Infinite Hope, is an autobiographical journey during the war.

In 1946, he enrolled at Columbia University School of General Studies to study philosophy. After the war, Bryan received a Fulbright Scholarship to study at the University of Marseille at Aix-en-Provence and later returning for two years to study at the University of Freiburg in Germany.

Bryan taught art at Queen's College, Philadelphia College of Art, the Dalton School, Lafayette College, and Dartmouth College. He retired as emeritus professor of art at Dartmouth in 1988.

In the late 1980s, when Bryan retired from Dartmouth, he moved to Islesford, Maine, on Little Cranberry Island. He lived there until he moved to Sugar Land, Texas, where his niece lived, in 2019.

The Ashley Bryan Center (501c3) was formed in 2013 to preserve, protect and care for Bryan's art, his collections, his books and to promote his legacy. In 2019, the Center and University of Pennsylvania reached an agreement to archive Bryan's works at the Kislak Center for Special Collections, Rare Books, and Manuscripts.

Bryan died at his niece's home on February 4, 2022, at the age of 98. He had congestive heart failure.

Bryan has received two American Library Association career literary awards for his "significant and lasting contributions", the 2009 Wilder Medal and the 2012 King-Hamilton Award. The Laura Ingalls Wilder Medal from the Association for Library Service to Children (ALSC) biennially recognizes one writer or illustrator of children's books published in the U.S. The committee named Dancing Granny, Beat the Story-Drum, Pum-Pum, and Beautiful Blackbird in particular and cited his "varied art forms". The Coretta Scott King-Virginia Hamilton Award from the Ethnic & Multicultural Information Exchange Round Table (EMIERT) biennially recognizes one African-American writer or illustrator of children's or young-adult literature. In 2008 Bryan was named a Literary Lion by The New York Public Library. In 2008, the Auburn Avenue Research Library on African-American History and Culture housed in the Atlanta-Fulton Public Library hosted the "Ashley Bryan Children's Literary Festival." He also received the University of Southern Mississippi Medallion from the Fay B. Kaigler Children's Book Festival in 1994.

For his lifetime work as a children's illustrator, Bryan was U.S. nominee in 2006 for the biennial, international Hans Christian Andersen Award, the highest recognition for creators of children's books.

The Ashley Bryan Art series was established at the African American Research Library and Cultural Center of the Broward County Library in 2002. Dr. Henrietta M. Smith, Professor Emerita at the University of South Florida (USF) School of Information, worked with the Broward County Library to establish the children's book author and illustrator art series named for Ashley Bryan. Dr. Smith was also the lector for the 2003 Alice G. Smith Lecture, a lecture series held at the USF School of Information "to honor the memory of its first director, Alice Gullen Smith, known for her work with youth and bibliotherapy." In 2012 the Ashley Bryan Art series celebrated ten years of exhibits and programs. "The series began with Ashley Bryan submitting eight original art pieces to the library to serve as core of the art collection." It became "a children's book author and illustrator series which has brought Coretta Scott King-Award winning authors and illustrators whose work reflected African culture to the library". "The Ashley Bryan Art series has had a long-lasting cultural effect upon the community bringing children and families into the library and engaging youth with children's book art and illustrations."

Bryan was honored by Maine governor Janet Mills who proclaimed July 13, 2020 "Ashley Frederick Bryan Day" for his lifetime contributions to the state.

For particular books he has been honored several times including multiple Coretta Scott King Awards and honors for illustration, the inaugural Lee Bennett Hopkins Poetry Award from the Pennsylvania State University, the Lupine Award from the Maine Library Association, and the Golden Kite Award for nonfiction.

1981, Coretta Scott King Award for illustration, Beat the Story Drum, Pum-Pum

2010, Golden Kite Award for nonfiction, Ashley Bryan: Words to My Life's Song

2017, Newbery Honor, Coretta Scott King Honor for writing and illustration, Lupine Award for picture book, Kirkus Prize for Young Readers' Literature finalist, Freedom Over Me: Eleven Slaves, Their Lives and Dreams Brought to Life by Ashley Bryan

2020, Carter G. Woodson Book Award, Coretta Scott King Award for illustration, Infinite Hope: A Black Artist's Journey from World War II to Peace

American composer Alvin Singleton composed Sing to the Sun, a commissioned work for the 1995-1996 season by a consortium of five musical festivals. The work consisted of a chamber orchestra made up of an oboe, clarinet, viola, piano and percussion, children's voices and a narrator, and drew upon the collection of poems by Bryan entitled: Sing to the Sun: Poems and Pictures. Bryan himself narrated the premiere and all the following performances.

On June 10, 2017 the world premiere of Alliance Theatre's production Dancing Granny took place at the Oglethorpe University's Conant Performing Arts Center in Atlanta, Georgia. The musical play was adapted for the stage from Bryan's book of the same name with music composed by Jireh Breon Holder and choreography by Ameenah Kaplan.

In 2018, Bryan collaborated with composer Aaron Robinson on an African-American requiem titled A Tender Bridge; a 90-minute, 13 movement work that celebrates Bryan's life and career based on his writings that uses "jazz, ragtime, Negro spirituals, Southern hymns and other musical idioms, along with a full choir, gospel choir, children's choir, orchestra jazz ensemble and multiple narrators."

In April 2021, Alliance Theatre also staged Beautiful Blackbird Live, based on the children's book by Bryan, Beautiful Blackbird. The concert version tells the story about five birds that have flown from Africa to sing about how beautiful it is to be black.

1. "IBBY Announces the Winners of the Hans Christian Andersen Awards 2006". International Board on Books for Young People (IBBY). Press release March 27, 2006.
"Hans Christian Andersen Awards". IBBY. Retrieved 2013-07-23.

2. "Welcome to the (Laura Ingalls) Wilder Award home page!". Association for Library Service to Children (ALSC). American Library Association (ALA). 2009. Archived from the original on February 1, 2010.

3. ^ Risen, Clay (February 9, 2022). "Ashley Bryan, Who Brought Diversity to Children's Books, Dies at 98". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331.

4. ^ Dlouhy, Caitlyn (August 3, 2015). "Profile of 2009 Wilder Award winner Ashley Bryan". The Horn Book Magazine.

5. Gold, Donna (December 1997 - January 1998). "Ashley Bryan's World". American Visions. 12 (6): 31. ISSN 0884-9390.

6. ^ Marcus, Leonard S. (2002). Ways of Telling: Conversations on the Art of the Picture Book. New York, NY: Dutton Children's Books. pp. 18-31. ISBN 0-525-46490-5.

7. ^ Smith, Harrison (February 8, 2022). "Ashley Bryan, whose joyous picture books celebrated Black life and history, dies at 98". Washington Post.

8. ^ Trotter, Bill (February 2, 2019). "Collection of artifacts by Maine artist finds out-of-state home". Bangor Daily News.

9. ^ "Ashley Bryan, prize-winning children's author, illustrator, dies at 98". NBC News. February 6, 2022.

10. ^ "Laura Ingalls Wilder Award, Past winners". ALSC. ALA.
"About the Laura Ingalls Wilder Award". ALSC. ALA. Retrieved 2013-03-10.

11. ^ "Ashley Bryan 2012 recipient of the Coretta Scott King-Virginia Hamilton Award for Lifetime Achievement". Press release January 23, 2012. ALA. Retrieved July 5, 2012.

12. "Coretta Scott King Book Awards". ALA. Retrieved July 5, 2012.

13. ^ "Past Medallion Recipients". University of Southern Mississippi. Archived from the original on August 1, 2016.

14. ^ Smith, Alice Gullen. 1989. "Will the real bibliotherapist please stand up?." Journal of Youth Services in Libraries 2, 241-249.

15. ^ Gómez, E. (2012). "Broward County Library Celebrates Ten Years of the Ashley Bryan Art Series". Children & Libraries. 10 (1): 18-19.

16. "Past Golden Kite Recipients". Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators. Archived from the original on August 20, 2022.

17. Keyes, Bob (January 28, 2020). "Ashley Bryan and Daniel Minter win national youth book awards".

18. ^ Gresham, Mark (November 18, 1995). "Sing To The Sun" (PDF). Vibes. Atlanta: Atlanta.CreativeLoafing.Com. p. 89.

19. ^ Thrash Murphy, Barbara (August 14, 2014). Black Authors and Illustrators of Books for Children and Young Adults. USA: Routledge. p. 38. ISBN 978-0415762731.

20. ^ Baldowski, Bill (June 3, 2017). "'Dancing Granny' kicking off Alliance's 2017-18 season". Northside Neighbor.

"Ashley Bryan". Gale Literary Databases Contemporary Authors Online. Archived from the original on August 28, 2008. (subscription required)

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Ashley Frederick Bryan (July 13, 1923 - February 4, 2022) was an American writer and illustrator of children's books. Most of his subjects are from the African-American experience. He was U.S. nominee for the Hans Christian Andersen Award in 2006 and he won the Laura Ingalls Wilder Award for his contribution to American children's literature in 2009.

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Carole Boston Weatherford

Carole Boston Weatherford is an African-American author and critic, now living in North Carolina, United States. She is the winner of the 2022 Coretta Scott King Award for Unspeakable: The Tulsa Race Massacre. She writes children's literature and some historical books, as well as poetry and commentaries. Weatherford is best known for her controversial criticism of Pokémon character Jynx and Dragon Ball character Mr. Popo. Today, she often writes with her son, Jeffery Boston Weatherford, who is an illustrator and poet.

The music of poetry has fascinated Weatherford and motivated her literary career.

Weatherford began writing in first grade by dictating poems to her mother. Her father taught printing at a local high school and published his daughter's early works. As a child, she enjoyed reading Dr. Seuss and Langston Hughes. Continuing to pursue creative writing as a hobby through high school and college, she later earned her M.F.A. from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro and an M.A. in publication design from the University of Baltimore. Although a Baltimore native, she now resides in North Carolina and teaches composition and children's literature at Fayetteville State University (FSU). Initially, Weatherford was invited to FSU as a writer-in-residence, but in 2007, she received the position of associate professor.

As an author, she acknowledges her calling "to mine the past for family stories, fading traditions and forgotten struggles." The books she writes, in poetry and prose, explore African-American history from a children's perspective and relate the past to new generations. Her works are often inspired by true events, many of which took place in the areas where Weatherford has lived. In her Author's Notes for each book, she includes a portion of the historical research from which her fiction or poetry emerged. In describing her purpose for writing to School Library Journal, in a 2008 interview, she said: "I want the books that I write that are set during the Jim Crow era and the Civil Rights era to nudge today's kids toward justice. We've gone a long way, but we still have a long way to go."

In 1995, Lee & Low Books published her first picture book, Juneteenth Jamboree, about a summer celebration in memory of the Texas Emancipation. She then wrote a series of board books for preschoolers. In 1998, she co-authored Somebody's Knocking at Your Door: AIDS and the African American Church, and then published a collection of poetry, The Tar Baby on the Soapbox. After establishing herself as a versatile writer for both children and adults, she published two nonfiction chapter books before penning her first award-winning children's book, The Sound That Jazz Makes (2001), a poem that traces the history of African-American music.

Since then, she has continued to write poetry, historical fiction, and nonfiction biographical works for children. She said in a 2008 interview that one of the most important poems she has written was Moses: When Harriet Tubman Led Her People to Freedom: "Those inspired words came together with Kadir Nelson's soulful paintings and Ellice Lee's brilliant art direction in a perfect publishing storm. Moses propelled my career to another level." Moses has won a Caldecott Award for illustration, as well as an NAACP Image Award for an Outstanding Literary Work for Children, and became a New York Times bestseller.

In 2008, Weatherford published her first poetic novel for young adults, Becoming Billie Holiday, about the development of the artist who she refers to as her muse.

In 2020, Weatherford published Box: Henry Brown Mails Himself to Freedom which was named a Newbery Honor Book.

Her book Unspeakable: The Tulsa Race Massacre, illustrated by Floyd Cooper and published by Carolrhoda Books, won both the Coretta Scott King Illustrator & Author awards in 2022. The novel was also a finalist for the Caldecott Medal as well as the Robert F. Sibert Informational Book Award.

Weatherford has written multiple articles attacking what she identifies as stereotyped caricatures of black people in East Asian popular culture, with two of the more prominent ones being geared toward anime, and another aimed at the name of a toothpaste brand.

In January 2000, Weatherford wrote an op-ed piece that ran in newspapers across Alabama. "Politically Incorrect Pokémon" explained how she believed that Pokémon #124, Jynx, was a negative stereotype of African Americans:

The character Jynx, Pokémon #124, has decidedly human features [in contrast to most other characters]: jet-black skin, huge pink lips, gaping eyes, a straight blonde mane and a full figure, complete with cleavage and wiggly hips. Put another way, Jynx resembles an overweight drag queen incarnation of Little Black Sambo, a stereotype from a children's book long ago purged from libraries.

In response to the controversy, Jynx's in-game sprites were given a purple skin color in the American versions of Pokémon Gold and Silver, released in late 2000. By 2002, Nintendo officially redesigned Jynx, changing its skin color from black to purple; this change was not reflected in the animated series until Jynx's purple skin appearance debuted in the episode "Mean With Envy!" (混戦、混乱！ポケモンコンテスト・キナギ大会！ （前編）), which originally aired in 2005, with the Amazon Prime release of "Holiday Hi-Jynx" recoloring Jynx accordingly, although it is still black on the thumbnail.

In an article published in The Christian Science Monitor in May 2000, Weatherford reiterated and expanded on her argument. Jynx had looked like "an obese drag queen" and she also offered Mr. Popo, a character from the Dragon Ball franchise, up for critique:

Mr. Popo is a rotund, turban-clad genie with pointy ears, jet-black skin, shiny white eyes and, yes, big red lips.

The Dragon Ball manga later released by Viz in 2003 had reduced the size of Mr. Popo's lips. Furthermore, media related to the series' sequel Dragon Ball Super showed an increase of black characters that strayed away from racist stereotypes, such as that of Goten and Trunks' classmates Rulah and Chok, and fewer references made to Mr. Popo (with the latest release Dragon Ball Super: Super Hero only indicating the character being off-screen).

The Sound that Jazz Makes

Carter G. Woodson Book Award (Elementary Level)

2001

Remember the Bridge

North Carolina AAUW Award for Juvenile Literature

2002

Freedom on the Menu

North Carolina AAUW Award for Juvenile Literature

2005

Bank Street College Best Children's Books

Capitol Choices: Notable Books for Children

2006

Notable Social Studies Trade Books for Young People

Moses

Capitol Choices: Notable Books for Children

2005

NAACP Image Award, Outstanding Literary Work for Children

2007

Teachers' Choice ( International Reading Association)

A Negro League Scrapbook

Notable Books for a Global Society

2006

Dear Mr. Rosenwald

Golden Kite Honor Award for Picture Book Text

Lee Bennett Hopkins Poetry Award

Jefferson Cup Award

Voice of Freedom: Fannie Lou Hamer: The Spirit of the Civil Rights Movement

Moses: When Harriet Tubman Led Her people to Freedom, with Kadir Nelson (illustrator), 2006, Jump at the Sun/Hyperion, ISBN 0-7868-5175-9

Dear Mr. Rosenwald, with R. Gregory Christie (illustrator), 2006, Scholastic Press, ISBN 0-439-49522-9. Second (paperback) edition: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, 2017, ISBN 978-1976098031.

Before John Was a Jazz Giant: A Song of John Coltrane, with Sean Qualls (illustrator), 2007, Henry Holt, ISBN 978-0-8050-7994-4

Becoming Billie Holiday, with Floyd Cooper (illustrator), 2008, Wordsong, ISBN 978-1-59078-507-2

Voice of Freedom: Fannie Lou Hamer, Spirit of the Civil Rights Movement, 2015. Illustrator Ekua Holmes was the 2016 winner of the Steptoe Award for New Talent.

A Song for the Unsung: Bayard Rustin, the Man Behind the 1963 March on Washington, illustrations by Byron McCray, 2022. Henry Holt and Co., ISBN 9781250779502.

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Carole Boston Weatherford is an African-American author and critic, now living in North Carolina, United States. She is the winner of the 2022 Coretta Scott King Award for Unspeakable: The Tulsa Race Massacre. She writes children's literature and some historical books, as well as poetry and commentaries.

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Bud, Not Buddy by Christopher Paul Curtis

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Bud, Not Buddy by Christopher Paul Curtis

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Bud, not Buddy, Curtis, Christopher Paul. | Gloria Coles Flint Public Library

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Who is Colin Kaepernick?, Wilson, Lakita | Gloria Coles Flint Public Library

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Curls, Forman, Ruth | Gloria Coles Flint Public Library