Jennifer Armstrong (1961–) Biography

(Julia Winfield)

Personal

Born 1961, in Waltham, MA; Education: Smith College, B.A., 1983. Hobbies and other interests: Gardening, teaching, music, reading.

Addresses

Agent—Susan Cohen, Writers House, 21 W. 26th St., New York, NY 10010.

Career

Cloverdale Press, New York, NY, assistant editor, 1983–85; freelance writer, 1985–; teacher. Girl Scout leader, 1987–89; Smith College, Northampton, MA, recruiter, 1990–95; leader of writing workshops. Literacy Volunteers of Saratoga, board president, 1991–93; puppy raiser for Guiding Eyes for the Blind. President and cofounder of Children's Literature Connection, Inc., 1997–.

Honors Awards

Best Book Award, American Library Association (ALA), and Golden Kite Honor Book Award, Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators, both 1992, and Teacher's Choice Award, International Reading Association (IRA), 1993, all for Steal Away; Notable Book citations, ALA, 1992, for Steal Away and Hugh Can Do; IRA/Children's Book Council (CBC) Children's Choice designation, 1995, for That Terrible Baby; Blue Ribbon Book designation, Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books, 1996, and Children's Books of Distinction designation, Hungry Mind Review, both 1997, both for The Dreams of Mairhe Mehan; Smithsonian Notable Books for Children citation, 1998, for Pockets; Children's Books of Distinction Award, Riverbank Review, 1998, for Mary Mehan Awake; Children's Books of Distinction Award, Riverbank Review, Orbis Pictus Award, National Council of Teachers of English, and Boston Globe/Horn Book Honor designation, all 1999, all for Shipwreck at the Bottom of the World: The Extraordinary True Story of Shackleton and the Endurance; Cuffies Award for Best Autobiography, Children's Booksellers, 1999, and Anisfeld-Wolf Book Award, and Children's Book of Distinction Award, Riverbank Review, both 2000, all for In My Hands; Best Children's Book of the Year Award, Bank Street College, 2001, for Spirit of Endurance; National Science Foundation artists and writers in the Antarctic grant, 2002.

Writings

Steal Away (novel), Orchard (New York, NY), 1992.

Hugh Can Do (picture book), illustrated by Kimberly Root, Crown (New York, NY), 1992.

Chin Yu Min and the Ginger Cat (picture book), illustrated by Mary GrandPre, Crown (New York, NY), 1993.

That Terrible Baby (picture book), illustrated by Susan Meddaugh, Tambourine Books (New York, NY), 1994.

Little Salt Lick and the Sun King (picture book), illustrated by Jon Goodell, Crown (New York, NY), 1994.

The Whittler's Tale (picture book), illustrated by Valery Vasiliev, Tambourine Books (New York, NY), 1994.

King Crow (picture book), illustrated by Eric Rohman, Crown (New York, NY), 1995.

Wan Hu Is in the Stars (picture book), illustrated by Barry Root, Tambourine Books (New York, NY), 1995.

Black-eyed Susan, illustrated by Emily Martindale, Crown (New York, NY), 1995.

The Dreams of Mairhe Mehan (young-adult novel; also see below), Knopf (New York, NY), 1996.

The Snowball, illustrated by Jean Pidgin, Random House (New York, NY), 1996.

Patrick Doyle Is Full of Blarney, illustrated by Krista Brauckmann-Towns, Random House (New York, NY), 1996.

Mary Mehan Awake (young adult novel; also see below), Knopf (New York, NY), 1996.

Sunshine, Moonshine, Random House (New York, NY), 1997.

Foolish Gretel, illustrated by Bill Dodge, Random House (New York, NY), 1997.

Lili the Brave, illustrated by Uldis Klavins, Random House (New York, NY), 1997.

Pockets (picture book), illustrated by Mary GrandPre, Crown (New York, NY), 1998.

Pierre's Dream (picture book), illustrated by Susan Gaber, Dial (New York, NY), 1999.

Theodore Roosevelt: Letters from a Young Coal Miner ("Dear Mr. President" series), Winslow Press (Delray Beach, FL), 2000.

Thomas Jefferson: Letters from a Philadelphia Bookworm ("Dear Mr. President" series), Winslow Press (Delray Beach, FL), 2000.

Becoming Mary Mehan: Two Novels (includes The Dreams of Mairhe Mehan and Mary Mehan Awake), Random House (New York, NY), 2002.

The Snowball, illustrated by Jean Pidgeon, Random House (New York, NY), 2003.

Once upon a Banana, illustrated by David Small, Simon & Schuster (New York, NY), 2006.

Magnus at the Fire, illustrated by Owen Smith, Simon & Schuster (New York, NY), 2005.

MIDDLE GRADE FICTION; "PETS, INC." SERIES

The Puppy Project, Bantam (New York, NY), 1990.

Too Many Pets, Bantam (New York, NY), 1990.

Hillary to the Rescue, Bantam (New York, NY), 1990.

That Champion Chimp, Bantam (New York, NY), 1990.

YOUNG ADULT FICTION; UNDER PSEUDONYM JULIA WINFIELD

Only Make Believe (part of "Sweet Dreams" series), Bantam (New York, NY), 1987.

Private Eyes (part of "Sweet Dreams" series), Bantam (New York, NY), 1989.

Partners in Crime (part of "Private Eyes" series), Bantam (New York, NY), 1989.

Tug of Hearts (part of "Private Eyes" series), Bantam (New York, NY), 1989.

On Dangerous Ground (part of "Private Eyes" series), Bantam (New York, NY), 1989.

JUVENILE FICTION; "WILD ROSE INN" SERIES

Bridie of the Wild Rose Inn, Bantam (New York, NY), 1994.

Ann of the Wild Rose Inn, Bantam (New York, NY), 1994.

Emily of the Wild Rose Inn, Bantam (New York, NY), 1994.

Laura of the Wild Rose Inn, Bantam (New York, NY), 1994.

Claire of the Wild Rose Inn, Bantam (New York, NY), 1994.

Grace of the Wild Rose Inn, Bantam (New York, NY), 1994.

"FIRE-US" TRILOGY; WITH NANCY BUTCHER

The Kindling, HarperCollins (New York, NY), 2002.

The Keepers of the Flame, HarperCollins (New York, NY), 2002.

The Kiln, HarperCollins (New York, NY), 2003.

NONFICTION

Shipwreck at the Bottom of the World: The Extraordinary True Story of Shackleton and the Endurance, Crown (New York, NY), 1998.

(With Irene Gut Opdyke) In My Hands: Memories of a Holocaust Rescuer, Knopf (New York, NY), 1999.

(With Peter Jennings and Todd Brewster) The Century for Young People, Doubleday (New York, NY), 1999.

Spirit of Endurance, illustrated by William Maughan, Crown (New York, NY), 2000.

(Editor) Shattered: Stories of Children and War, Knopf (New York, NY), 2002.

A Three-Minute Speech: Lincoln's Remarks at Gettysburg, illustrated by Albert Lorenz, Aladdin (New York, NY), 2003.

Audubon: Painter of Birds in the Wild Frontier, Abrams (New York, NY), 2003.

(Editor) What a Song Can Do: Twelve Riffs on the Power of Music, Knopf (New York, NY), 2004.

Photo by Brady: A Picture of the Civil War, Atheneum (New York, NY), 2005.

The American Story: 100 True Tales from American History, illustrated by Roger Roth, Knopf (New York, NY), 2006.

Sidelights

Jennifer Armstrong is a versatile writer of young-adult novels, middle-grade fiction, chapter books, picture books, and series books for both young and older readers. Some of her best writing is in the genre of historical fiction, such as the award-winning Steal Away, about a runaway slave and the white girl who accompanies her, and the U.S. Civil War The Dreams of Mairhe Mehan and its sequel, Mary Mehan Awake. Armstrong asks large questions in such novels and takes risks as a writer. She has also been lauded for her picture books, such as Hugh Can Do, and for such historical series as "Wild Rose Inn," documenting the fictional lives of several generations of young girls whose families all inhabit the same Massachusetts tavern. Along with the number of works credited to her under her real name and under the pseudonym Julia Winfield, Armstrong has ghost-written over fifty titles in the "Sweet Valley High" series, and its spin-off, "Sweet Valley Kids."

After graduating from college, Armstrong worked as an assistant editor at Cloverdale Press in New York City. Although she quickly discovered that this entry-level position was more of a secretarial posting than an editorial one, after a learning period she was entrusted with her own projects. She also began writing for the "Sweet Valley High" series as well as for its spin-off "Sweet Valley Kids" chapter books for younger readers, viewing this work as a writing apprenticeship. "I learned scene and dialogue," Armstrong explained in Something about the Author Autobiography Series (SAAS), "I learned pacing, I learned plot and chapter structure, and most of all, I learned to write fast. Not infrequently I had to write a one-hundred-and-thirty-page book in four weeks. It was like being trained on a daily newspaper. I also lost all fear of 'writing a book.' I could write books at the drop of a hat."

Writing under the pseudonym Julia Winfield, Armstrong penned five series books of her own, two for the "Sweet Dreams" series and three more for the "Private Eyes" series as a tip of the hat to Nancy Drew and the Hardy Boys. The second "Sweet Dreams" title, Private Eyes, was the inspiration for the detective series. Reviewing Partners in Crime, the first novel in the "Private Eyes" series, a Publishers Weekly contributor noted that it "blends romance with a fairly complicated mystery, providing light entertainment." Such easy reading was exactly Armstrong's intent with these books, as well as her middle-grade series "Pets, Inc.," about girls who take care of neighborhood pets.

The first novel to bear Armstrong's name, Steal Away is a mix of adventure story, memoir, and coming-of-age tale that explores friendship, the nature of courage, race relations, and the history of slavery. Taking structural inspiration from Wallace Stegner's Angle of Repose, Armstrong moves her story back and forth across time by employing three fictional voices. Two of these voices are those of the young girls involved in the adventure; the third is that of one of the protagonist's granddaughters, who responds forty years later to the story her grandmother tells her. Young Susannah, abolitionist-minded, is orphaned in Vermont and sent to relatives in Virginia where she is given her own slave, Bethlehem. These two girls become friends and run away together to the north. Well received by critics and readers alike, Steal Away ultimately won a Golden Kite award. Reviewing the novel in School Library Journal, Ann Welton noted that "the issues explored in this book run deep" and the book "will go a long way toward explicating the damage done by slavery."

Published the same year, Armstrong's first picture book, Hugh Can Do, blends a poetic structure with a folktale-like story, creating what School Library Journal reviewer Kate McClelland deemed "an especially nice balance of dramatic tension, droll humor, and positive philosophy." Several more picture books have followed, including the award-winning Chin Yu Min and the Ginger Cat.

The critical success of Steal Away allowed Armstrong to find a market for her next project: a six-book series of historical romances. Based on the tales of six girls living in a family-run tavern in Marblehead, Massachusetts, the stories span three centuries. "Keeping to the same family, the same house, and the same town, while changing historical periods, was an interesting writing job," Armstrong noted in SAAS. The series begins in 1695 with Bridie of the Wild Rose Inn, in which sixteen-year-old Bridie immigrates to North America from Scotland, to be reunited with the family that had arrived a decade earlier. Now prospering as owners of Marblehead's Wild Rose Inn, Bridie's family has conformed to the Puritan faith and culture of the Massachusetts colony, and the Scottish teen quickly discovers that she must as well. Trouble ensues when she is attracted to young Will Handy and is subsequently declared a witch after going to local Indians for an herbal cure for her sick brother. Booklist critic Sheilamae O'Hara called Bridie of the Wild Rose Inn a "promising beginning to a series of historical novels that can be read for diversion or as an adjunct to an American history unit." Writing in Wilson Library Bulletin, Cathi Dunn MacRae declared that "Armstrong's vivid language paints a striking picture of a harsh land and somber folk." Reviewing the second novel in the series, Ann of the Wild Rose Inn, set in 1774, MacRae went on to note that this "dramatic tale of Crown versus Colony telescopes the dawn of the American Revolution into one young girl's view."

Armstrong has also incorporated history into several of her fictional chapter books. Basing stories of immigrants to the United States on a July 4th motif, Armstrong sets her stories on or around Independence Day. She also weaves into these tales elements of well-known folktales, myths, or legends from the country of origin of each protagonist. Thus in Lili the Brave, the young Norwegian protagonist must become something of a Viking heroine, while Patrick Boyle Is Full of Blarney finds a young Irish immigrant growing up in New York's Hell's Kitchen re-enacting St. Patrick's feat of driving the snakes from Ireland. In this latter tale, the legend is replayed as the defeat of a street gang known as the Copperheads. Charlyn Lyons, reviewing Patrick Boyle Is Full of Blarney for School Library Journal, dubbed it a "beginning chapter book that's sure to be a hit." For Foolish Gretel, Armstrong adapts a Grimm's fairy tale, setting her version of the story in Galveston, Texas, in 1854. "World folklore and mythology are full of stories," Armstrong noted in SAAS, "and reading them in conjunction with the immigration history of different nationalities almost gives me these stories ready-made. It is a delight to write them."

In her books for middle graders and older teens Armstrong also explores the past. Black-eyed Susan is about the geography of the prairie and how that bleak environment can either lift or crush the human spirit. Susie, the novel's protagonist, is a pioneer girl who loves her South Dakota home, but for Susie's mother the prairie is a desert compared with the tree-filled landscape of the woman's native Ohio. Susie ultimately helps her mother break through her depression when she encounters an Icelandic family on their way west to homestead. Set within a twenty-four-hour span, Black-eyed Susan explores the extent of family relationships and the spirit of the settlers in the American frontier. "Armstrong writes in a simple but quite literary style," a Kirkus Reviews contributor observed, and Margaret B. Rafferty noted in School Library Journal that the author's "elegant, spare prose is readable and evocatively recreates the time and place."

Armstrong's 1996 novel, The Dreams of Mairhe Mehan, "proved to be the most challenging one I have yet written," as the author noted in SAAS. Young Mairhe Mehan, an Irish barmaid working in the Swampoodle district of Washington, D.C., during the U.S. Civil War, has allegiances to two countries. In some ways she is still Irish; in others very much American. When her older brother, Mike, decides to fight for the Union the young man's decision breaks the heart of his Irish father, and Mairhe finds herself caught in the middle of the conflict. Noted American poet Walt Whitman plays a role in this story, serving as Mairhe's inspiration to work as a nurse in army hospitals. A critic in Kirkus Reviews deemed the novel a "haunting, eloquent story," citing Armstrong's "breathtaking virtuosity" in blending "vision and reality." Booklist contributor Linda Perkins felt that "this grim, gritty, working-class view of the Civil War provides a unique perspective and could be valuable in a curriculum." Armstrong is never one for formulaic happy endings, and with the death of Mike, part of Mairhe's world dies as well.

Mairhe returns in Mary Mehan Awake, and the young Irish girl now spells her name in the American fashion. In the wake of Mike's death, she is persuaded by Whitman to leave Washington for the more therapeutic climes of upstate New York where she is employed as a naturalist's assistant by Jasper and Diana Dorset. Mary's journey north provides salvation for her, as she begins to recover at the Dorsets', partly as a result of their kindness, partly through interaction with a veteran made deaf by the war who is working as gardener at the Dorsets' home. Anne O'Malley concluded in Booklist that while lacking the "lively action" of the first novel, Mary Mehan Awake contains "beautiful writing [that] captures personalities deftly, and fully evokes Mary's internal suffering and quietude." Jennifer M. Brabander, writing in Horn Book, likened the novel to "The Secret Garden for an older audience, with friendship and nature gratifyingly providing healing and wholeness."

Armstrong moves to nonfiction with her 1998 book, Shipwreck at the Bottom of the World. This depiction of British explorer Ernest Shackleton's 1914 expedition and his heroic and ultimately tragic efforts to cross Antarctica by foot is crafted into "an unforgettable story of true heroism and the triumph of the human spirit," according to Edward Sullivan writing in School Library Journal. Sullivan concluded that Armstrong's book "will capture the attention and imagination of any reader," while Christine Hepperman noted in Riverbank Review that Shipwreck at the Bottom of the World is one "to finish in one breathless sitting, then dream about all night long." Armstrong retells the same story for younger readers in Spirit of Endurance. On her home page she explained her reason for moving from fiction-writing to tell of Shackleton's exploits: "I always thought it was one of the greatest adventures I had ever heard about. At the time, nobody had written a book about the voyage for kids, so when I decided I'd like to try writing nonfiction I picked this story to write." Spirit of Endurance, which describes the travails encountered by Shackleton's ship, Endurance, and her crew in picture-book format, "masterfully foreshortens the key events" of the Antarctica expedition, according to a Publishers Weekly reviewer. Patricia Manning, writing in School Library Journal, felt the book offers "a good picture of human survival."

Armstrong's experience with nonfiction has grown beyond her two books on Shackleton, to encompass In My Hands: Memories of a Holocaust Rescuer, a memoir written in collaboration with Irene Gut Opdyke, a woman who sheltered Jews during the Holocaust; a picture-book biography of John James Audubon titled Audubon: Painter of Birds in the Wild Frontier; and a volume discussing how Matthew Brady's photographs affected the U.S. Civil War titled Photo by Brady: A Picture of the Civil War. In her youth, Opdyke worked at an officers' dining room, and she used her position to begin hiding Jews. Kristi Beavin wrote in a review of In My Hands for Horn Book that "the power of this tale lies as much in the text's matter-of-fact narration of events as it does in the cumulative courage" of Opdyke. Audubon follows the noted naturalist and artist on his travels between 1804 and 1812, and features artwork by both illustrator Joe A. Smith and by Audubon himself. "Armstrong and Smith make a great team in this immensely likeable biographical portrait," wrote a critic for Kirkus Reviews, describing the book as "an excellent example of what picture-book biography can be." Photo by Brady 'gives youngsters a double exposure of the Civil War," explained Betty Carter in Horn Book, the critic describing how the four sections of the book provide both facts and an overview about the war itself, as well as information about how print photography affected the public's understanding of the war.

As an editor, Armstrong has produced two collections of stories and essays. Shattered: Stories of Children and War collects short stories from authors including M.E. Kerr and David Lubar that focus on the effects of war on the lives of the young people living through them. "The stories are remarkable not only for their depth, but also for how much they avoid cliché," wrote a critic for Kirkus Reviews. What a Song Can Do: Twelve Riffs on the Power of Music collects essays from authors describing the impact music had on their lives. The essays "show the power of both words and music to express the turbulent emotions of growing up," Jennifer Mattson wrote in Booklist.

In 2002, Armstrong published The Kindling, the first volume in the "Fire-Us" series coauthored with Nancy Butcher. The two authors planned the outline together, and Armstrong wrote the even chapters for each book in the series while Butcher wrote the odd chapters. The series takes place in a futuristic, post-apocalyptic world in which almost all of the adult population has been wiped out. The surviving children and teens of a small U.S. town band together and form a new type of family unit suitable for the new world they now live. Older teens Mommy, Teacher, and Hunter, as well as young ones Teddy Bear, Baby, and Doll. The children have grown into the roles they are named after and have all but forgotten life before the virus wiped out everything they had known. Their lives are changed again when a teen called Angerman draws them, along with two feral young ones called Puppy and Kitty, into his quest to find the president and figure out how a deadly virus could have killed so many. Paula Rohrlick, writing in Kliatt, called The Kindling "a riveting, powerful tale, with underpinnings of religion." Trish Anderson noted in School Library Journal that while the first book lacks a solid conclusion, "the cliff-hanger ending will leave [readers] interested to see what happens next."

In Keepers of the Flame the children find a groups of adults who have survived the plague and have taken up residence in an abandoned shopping mall. At first glad to be taken care of, they soon realize that in trade, they give up their own power to make decisions. They soon realize that something sinister lurks beneath the surface pleasantness the adults offer, and they flee. "The kids relationships and their desperate struggle to help one another survive make mesmerizing reading," noted Sally Estes in her Booklist review. Paula Rohrlick stated in Kliatt: "The action is fast and furious and the suspense never lets up in this powerful series. The second book doesn't disappoint."

In the final book of the "Fire-Us" series, The Kiln, the teens and their charges take refuge in a hold for the elderly that was somehow spared from the virus, then continue their quest to find the resident, only to discover that the truth is worse than they suspected. "This adventure is jam-packed with thrills, narrow escapes, and grief, and the answers will satisfy fans," commented a Kirkus Reviews contributor. Paula Rohrlick in Kliatt considered the book a good conclusion: "The suspense runs high … and all the loose ends from the other books are neatly wrapped up."

History and dreams are sometimes interchangeable in Armstrong's work. "I wanted to write about how we understand history, how we tell it," she noted in SAAS, "how hearing an adventure forty years old can change our lives today, how storytelling is an active, dynamic process rather than a passive, static one." While Armstrong wrote these words about her inspiration for her first non-series novel, Steal Away, they could apply to much of the rest of her work also.