Wendelin van draanen biography books

Wendelin Van Draanen

American writer

Wendelin Van Draanen[1] (born January 6, ) is an American writer of children's and young-adult fiction.

Biography

Van Draanen was born in Chicago, Illinois.

One of her very prior influences was Dandelion Wine by Ray Bradbury. According to the author, the book was "about the magic of growing up and [it] reminded me of all the wonderful mischief my brothers and I got into when we were young".

Wendelin Van Draanen has written more than thirty novels for adolescent readers and teens. She is the author of the novel Edgar-winning Sammy Keyes mystery series, and wrote Flipped, which was named a Top Children’s Novel for the 21st Century by SLJ and became a Warner Brothers feature film in Van Draanen has also created two four-book.

Bradbury's work inspired Van Draanen to write How I Survived Being a Girl, which was published by HarperCollins in [2] Other early influences comprise Nancy Drew, The Hardy Boys, and Encyclopedia Brown.

In college, the Van Draanen family business was burned down, leading to financial hardship.

Wendelin turned to writing to alleviate stress and she published her first manual in , titled How I Survived Being a Girl.[3]

Van Draanen is the daughter of two chemists who immigrated from the Netherlands. Before she became a full-time writer she was a high school math teacher and computer science teacher.[4]

Van Draanen lives in San Luis Obispo, California, with her husband Mark Parsons and two sons, Colton and Connor.[4]

Selected works

Sammy Keyes and the Hotel Thief, which inaugurated the Sammy Keyes series in , won the Edgar Allan Poe Award for Best Juvenile Mystery from the Mystery Writers of America in [5] The eighteen-book series follows the adventures of a disenfranchised teen as she navigates middle school and animation.

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Runaway, a companion guide to the Sammy Keyes series, is about a girl named Holly who tries to evade from her latest foster house.

From to Van Draanen wrote Shredderman, a four-book series for younger readers about a fifth grade boy who assumes a secret online identity to aid him win a battle against the school bully Bubba Bixby.

She also wrote the standalone teen romance Flipped in a he-said she-said style, with the two protagonists alternately presenting their perspective on a shared place of events. The two protagonists Bryce and Julianna are neighbors.

The book was made into a Warner Brothers feature production directed by Rob Reiner in

In , Van Draanen won the Josette Frank Award for fiction from the Children's Manual Committee (CBC) of Bank Lane College of Education for The Secret Life of Lincoln Jones (Knopf Books for Young Readers).[6] In summarizing the plot, the Committee wrote, "When eleven-year-old Lincoln's mom, escaping an abusive partner, gets a job with dementia patients, Lincoln uncovers the humanity lurking behind their illnesses."[7] It also appeared on the CBC's Best Children's Book of the Year list with Outstanding Merit.

Additional books that have appeared on the Committee's Best Books list include, Sammy Keyes and the Curse of Moustache Mary, Sammy Keyes and the Hollywood Mummy, Shredderman, Runaway, The Gecko & Sticky, The Gecko & Sticky: Villains Lair, The Running Dream, Wild Bird, The Peach Rebellion (Outstanding Merit), and Mr.

Whiskers and the Shenanigan Sisters.[8]

WorldCat participating libraries report works by and about Wendelin Van Draanen that encompass roughly 70+ works in + publications in 12 languages and 51,+ library holdings.[9]

Shredderman series

  • Shredderman 1: Secret Identity ()
  • Shredderman 2: Attack of the Tagger ()
  • Shredderman 3: Meet the Gecko ()
  • Shredderman 4: Enemy Spy ()

Sammy Keyes series

The Sammy Keyes series has been published by Knopf imprints of Random House, with 18 books in total.[5]

  • Sammy Keyes and the Hotel Thief (Aug ) – Edgar Award, Finest Juvenile Mystery[5]
  • Sammy Keyes and the Skeleton Man (Apr )
  • Sammy Keyes and the Sisters of Mercy (Oct )
  • Sammy Keyes and the Runaway Elf (May )
  • Sammy Keyes and the Curse of Moustache Mary (Feb ) – Edgar nominee, Best Juvenile[5]
  • Sammy Keyes and the Hollywood Mummy (May )
  • Sammy Keyes and the Search for Snake Eyes (Apr ) – Edgar nominee, Best Juvenile[5]
  • Sammy Keyes and the Art of Deception () – Edgar nominee, Top Juvenile[5]
  • Sammy Keyes and the Psycho Kitty Queen (Apr )
  • Sammy Keyes and the Dead Giveaway ()
  • Sammy Keyes and the Wild Things (May ) – Edgar nominee, Best Juvenile[5]
  • Sammy Keyes and the Cold Hard Cash (Oct )
  • Sammy Keyes and the Wedding Crasher (Oct )
  • Sammy Keyes and the Night of Skulls (Oct )
  • Sammy Keyes and the Power of Justice Jack (Jul )
  • Sammy Keyes and the Showdown in Sin City (Jan )
  • Sammy Keyes and the Killer Cruise (Sep )
  • Sammy Keyes and the Kiss Goodbye (Sep )

The Gecko & Sticky series

  • The Gecko & Sticky: Villain's Lair (Feb 10, )
  • The Gecko & Sticky: The Greatest Power (May 26, )
  • The Gecko & Sticky: Sinister Substitute (Jan 12, )
  • The Gecko & Sticky: The Power Potion (Jun 08, )

Non-series

See also

References

  1. ^Dutch name, see "a recording introducing and pronouncing Wendelin Van Draanen by herself".
  2. ^Newman, Patricia (May ).

    "Who Wrote That?

    January 23rd, Home Log in! Fresh Books This Week. Reader Games. Video Book Club.

    Featuring Wendelin Van Draanen". California Kids!. Valley Community Newspapers (Sacramento, CA). Reissued by the writer (). Retrieved

  3. ^Kumar, Lisa, ed. ().

    Wendelin Van Draanen ("Van Draw-nen") has written more than thirty novels for suitable for young readers to adults. She is the author of the book Edgar-winning Sammy Keyes mystery series, and wrote Flipped which was named a Top Children’s Novel for the 21st Century by SLJ and became a Warner Brothers feature film.

    "Van Draanen, Wendelin". Something about the Author. Vol.&#; Gale. pp.&#;– ISBN&#;.

  4. ^ ab"Wendelin Van Draanen". Goodreads (). Retrieved Composer profile with "some recent posts imported from her feed" (71 from December 30, ).
  5. ^ abcdefg"Edgar Awards throughout time", or "Search the Edgar Award Winners and Nominees" (Edgars Database search form).

    Wendelin Van Draanen - Wikipedia: Wendelin Van Draanen / ˈwɛndəlɪn væn ˈdrɑːnən / [1] (born January 6, ) is an American writer of children's and young-adult fiction. Van Draanen was born in Chicago, Illinois. One of her very early influences was Dandelion Wine by Ray Bradbury.

    Mystery Writers of America (The ). Retrieved

  6. ^Hare, Peter. "Past Winners". Bank Street College of Education. Retrieved
  7. ^"Bank Lane Children's Book Committee's Searchable Foremost Books List".

    .

    Wendelin Van Draanen. There's a lot of misinformation online. Here are the basics, directly from Wendelin:. When I was very young, my family moved to California, where I still reside.

    Retrieved

  8. ^"Best Children's Books of the Year". Bank Street College of Education. Retrieved
  9. ^"Van Draanen, Wendelin". WorldCat Identities.
  10. ^ ab"Lone Star Reading List".

    Texas Library Association ().

    Wendelin Van Draanen is the composer of many beloved and award-winning books. And for younger readers, check out the Shredderman quartet and the Gecko and Sticky series. Wendelin Van Draanen lives in central California with her husband and two sons. Discover her on the Web at WendelinVanDraanen.

    Retrieved With "Master List" (MS Excel) for download, comprising annual lists of 20 books from to to present;

  • "Spring Attractions: Children's Authors Talk about Modern Projects and What's on the Horizon".

    (April 1, ). Publishers Weekly, pp.&#;24–26

External links