Sharon Creech | |
|---|---|
 Creech in 2009 | |
| Born | (1945-07-29)July 29, 1945 (age 79) South Euclid, Ohio, U.S. |
| Occupation | Novelist |
| Genre | Children's novels,low fantasy,magic realism;poetry |
| Notable works | Walk Two Moons Ruby Holler |
| Notable awards | Newbery Medal 1995 Carnegie Medal 2002 |
| Website | |
| sharoncreech | |
Sharon Creech (born July 29, 1945) is an American writer ofchildren's novels. She was the first American winner of theCarnegie Medal for British children's books and the first person to win both the AmericanNewbery Medal and the British Carnegie.[1][a]
Sharon Creech was born inSouth Euclid, Ohio, a suburb of Cleveland, where she grew up with her parents (Ann and Arvel), one sister (Sandy), and three brothers (Dennis, Doug and Tom).[2] She would often visit her cousins in Quincy,Lewis County, Kentucky, which has found its way into many of her books as the fictional Bybanks, Kentucky. Bybanks appears inWalk Two Moons,Chasing Redbird, andBloomability, and there is an allusion to it inThe Wanderer.[2]
At college in the U.S. she became intrigued by story-telling after taking literature and writing courses, and she later became a teacher ofsecondary school English and Writing in England and Switzerland.[2] Her first children's novel,Absolutely Normal Chaos, was published only in the U.K., byMacmillan Children's Books in 1990. Called "comedy about contemporary teen life" byKirkus Reviews, it featured a 13-year-old girl's "complete and unabridged journal for English class".[3] Her first book published in the U.S. wasWalk Two Moons (1994), which won the AmericanNewbery Medal in 1995. Later that year,Absolutely Normal Chaos was first published in the U.S. by HarperCollins —set in her hometown Euclid, Ohio.[3]
Creech returned to the U.S. in 1998 after 18 years abroad.[4] She is married to Lyle Rigg, a headmaster in New Jersey, and has two grown children, Rob and Karin.[2]
She has written both novels and picture books. She often embeds serious topics into her stories, including such themes as independence, trust, childhood, adulthood, and death, often using humour to soften them.
Books such asLove That Dog andHeartbeat were written in verse, whereas other books likeRuby Holler andWalk Two Moons are in a narrative style.
Bloomability (1998) features an American girl at aboarding school in Switzerland. The setting was inspired byThe American School In Switzerland, where Creech taught English.
She returned to the fictional school exercise inLove That Dog (Harper Collins and Bloomsbury, 2001), theblank verse diary of "Jack, a reluctant student, [who] resists poetry assignments from his teacher, Miss Stretchberry."[4] It was a commended runner-up for the British Carnegie Medal.[1][5][b]
In 1995,Walk Two Moons won theNewbery Medal from theAmerican Library Association, recognizing the year's best children's book by an American author. In the U.K., it won the annualChildren's Book Award for long novels, voted by children, and the Reading Association Award. In 1997, it also won the Literaturhaus Award, Austria, and the Young Adult Sequoyah Award, Oklahoma, USA .[6]
Bloomability won the IRA/CBC Children's Choices award in 1999.[7]
The Wanderer won theParents' Choice Award, USA, in 2000, and was a runner-up for the Newbery Medal.[8] It was one of eight books on the Carnegie Medal shortlist in the U.K.[1]
Creech andLove That Dog were a commended runner-up for the 2001Carnegie Medal,[9] and she won the 2002 Medal from theBritish librarians, recognizingRuby Holler as the year's best children's book published in the U.K.[1][10][11]
