In addition to writing for adults, I’ve recently done some fiction for children, published by a remarkable company, Homecourt Publishers, that believes learning should be fun for kids and easy for teachers to teach.  Many of the books are sold to school systems in the Carolinas, but they’re appropriate for young readers nationwide.  Check out www.homecourtpublishers.com.

On a Roll in the Suburbs, a novella for 3rd to 5th-graders, is about an eleven-year-old girl who, in 1958, turns her hobby of roller skating into an idea for a young inventor’s competition . . . only to find that she’s a bit ahead of her time. (Maybe nobody wanted a skateboard back then — not yet, anyway.)

The book is part of a series of nine novellas by different authors, called “The Lost Years” because it covers periods of U.S. history that have been difficult for teachers to make interesting. Each is told from the point of view of a child living through everything from the Revolutionary War to the Great Depression to the social changes of the 1950’s in On A Roll in the Suburbs.

The Power of Sharpe Thinking is the overall title for a series of three solve-it-yourself mystery books (remember Encyclopedia Brown?) — great fun to read, and educational, too.  Based on the science standards kids are learning in school, the tales star middle-school twins Scott and Angie Sharpe, who unravel many a dilemma with their scientific acumen — but not before giving the reader a chance to puzzle out the answers, too.

My two other books for young people are a teen novel for boys, and a children’s picture book for baby girls and their dads.

Takedown, written with my late husband under the pen name E.M.J. Benjamin, is a young adult novel about a high school wrestler whose quest for the state championship is thrown into turmoil after he’s diagnosed with epilepsy. A fast-moving wrestling story as well as a tale about dealing with life issues, it was published in 1999, became a “Foreword Magazine” book award finalist, and remains popular with wrestling fans and with what one reviewer called “boys who don’t like to read.” For more information, check out the “Books” section of this site.

Daddy and the Pink Flash is a children’s picture book about how two generations of new dads bond with their baby daughters while lifting them into the air, flying them around the room, turning them into the smart, the brave, the fearless, the artistic, the magnificent . . . Pink Flash! Illustrated by Carol Tornatore.