One of the most featured authors of teen book sites and MySpace discussions is joining us for our Young Adult event on Sunday, April 19.Ellen Wittlinger is a former children’s librarian, Iowa Writer’s Workshop graduate, and Provincetown Fine Arts Work Center fellow (twice!) who writes YA books that realistically portrays the issues of today's teenagers. She doesn’t shy away from controversial topics such as oral sex and gay teens coming out, which caused residents in Alabama to try to censor her novel Sandpiper, while high schoolers all over the country devour her books.
Ellen started out as a poet and published Breakers in 1979. It wasn’t until she had two kids of her own and was working as a children’s librarian that she thought of writing for the YA market. She found her true calling; after two other successful novels, Hard Love was published in 1999 and became an American Library Association Michael L. Printz Honor Book, a Lambda Literary Award winner, and a Booklist Editors' Choice. She wrote nine more great books for the YA audience. Her most recent, Love & Lies, is a companion book to the award-winning Hard Love. In it, Marisol returns to accomplish two things: write a novel and to fall in love. “Marisol remains the character we came to know and love in Hard Love: unflinching, unsentimental, and wickedly funny. She is one of the most realistic lesbian characters ever to appear in a young adult novel. " -- K. T. Horning, Worth the Trip
But you don't have to be a teenager to enjoy Ellen’s books! Check out to these interviews conducted by the various audiences who love Ellen Wittlinger’s prose: Author profile on teenreads.com, Teacher Trenches: An Interview with Ellen Wittlinger, and Ravenstone Press’ Authors Among Us - Children's Writers Who Are or Who Have Been Librarians. See you all on the 19!
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