AdLit.org is a national multimedia project offering information and resources to the parents and educators of struggling adolescent readers and writers. AdLit.org is an educational initiative of WETA, the flagship public television and radio station in the nation's capital, and is funded by Carnegie Corporation of New York and by the Ann B. and Thomas L. Friedman Family Foundation.
Bio
Born in Columbus, Ohio, Jacqueline Woodson grew up in Greenville, South Carolina, and Brooklyn, New York and graduated from college with a B.A. in English. She now writes full-time and has recently received the Margaret A. Edwards Award for lifetime achievement in writing for young adults. Her other awards include a Newbery Honor, two Coretta Scott King awards, two National Book Award finalists, and the Los Angeles Times Book Prize. Although she spends most of her time writing, Woodson also enjoys reading the works of emerging writers and encouraging young people to write, spending time with her friends and her family, and sewing. Jacqueline Woodson currently resides in Brooklyn, New York.
Selected Books
from Jacqueline Woodson
Age Level: 9-12
Narrator Frannie keenly observes the changing dynamics in her classroom when a new white student arrives. Frannie also frets about her family — her deaf brother isolated from the hearing world and her pregnant mother prone to miscarriages.
Age Level: 14-16
A common love of Tupac Shakur unites three preteens: two from comfortable lives and one, D Foster, who can really relate to Tupac's lyrics.
Age Level: 9-12
Disguised as boys, Lena and her sister Dion flee their father's abuse. They hitchhike to their mother's hometown in Kentucky in hopes of finding a relative to care for them.
Age Level: 9-12
Through a class poetry assignment, fifth-grader Lonnie reveals the house fire that killed his parents, his separation from his sister, his life in foster care, and his community's struggle with poverty and racism.
Age Level: 9-12
Lonnie, aka Locomotion (first introduced in Locomotion) tries to connect with his sister and to prevent forgetting their "real" parents. As he writes Lili, readers learn about his life including his foster brother who has returned from the Iraq war.
The House You Pass Along the Way
Age Level: 12-14
Not only is 14-year-old Staggerlee self-named, she a child of the county's only interracial marriage. Moreover, Staggerlee is struggling with an attraction to other girls, something that she can share only with a 14-year-old cousin who visits for the summer.
Age Level: 12-14
Growing up is particularly difficult for Evie Green as she has no past. She lost it when her father testified against fellow police officers in a racially motivated murder. Each family member must learn to deal with their new lives and identities alone.
Age Level: 12-14
Two 15 year olds — one black one white — meet and fall in love at an excusive New York prep school. Both deal with their family issues as well as with how their growing relationship is received. This difficult novel is told in the couple's alternating voices — until the wrenching and tragic conclusion.
