Author of over 400 Books for Children and Adults
I was asked to write a book of poems about the sacred places around the world. Frankly, I didn’t think it would work, but I couldn’t help trying. It meant reading about twenty different religions and finding a particular sacred place to represent each
Another dream-inspired book, this adventure with two very different boys, an enchanted house, a talking white cat, a bumptious dog, and the Wild Hunt itself, is really a gloss on the entire genre of fantasy. It may be the most seriously weird book I have ever written.
Another book that started with a dream, this story predates the Harry Potter books by eight years. A young inept wizard who turns out to be in some ways the most powerful of them all, my hero is named Henry (not Harry) but renamed Thornmallow when he gets to the Wizard’s Hall. The Hall is a school,
Original stories by a variety of authors, including the first publication of my “The King’s Dragon.” Though the Introduction is signed by all three authors, I wrote it. And I chose all the stories and edited them. Marty did the business end of things.
An Arthurian spoof, with animals instead of people: King Earthor (an owl), Sir Belliful (a groundhog), Sir Tarryhere (a tortoise), Sir Gimmemore (a rabbit) Sir Runsalot (a mouse) and the Wizard Squirrelin. The knights and wizard go off to save the kingdom, sneak past a dragon, and finally manage
Published simultaneously in hardcover and paperback, this was the second (and alas, last) in the series of science fiction mysteries. I actually had written a lot of the third book when this particular line of Knopf books was declared dead. That’s publishing for you.
A short science fiction novel about a runaway boy who catches a ride with a van delivering hand-signing chimps to a California lab. A big earthquake destroys the road, tips over the van, kills the driver, and boy and chimp have to make their way through a devastated countryside to San Francisco.
This tall tale is based on some Stemple family history. My husband, David Stemple, was born and brought up inWest Virginia, up in the mountains, We had a number of family vacations there. He actually had an Uncle Lemon. David’s older brother Bill taught him to “fish for chickens.” FJ (for
I thought of this as a possible series and then never wrote a second book. About a group of girls (and one boy who is an honorary girl) who solve mysteries.
A folk tale chapter book set in an unnamed Arabic country where a slave boy helps to raise and train a flying horse. This was Barbara Berger’s first book. She had been one of my students at Centrum and I introduced her to Ann Beneduce who started her on her very illustrious career.