Most Popular Books by Jacqueline Woodson

A #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER! Featured in its own episode in the Netflix original show Bookmarks: Celebrating Black Voices! National Book Award winner Jacqueline Woodson and two-time Pura Belpré Illustrator Award winner Rafael López have teamed up to create a poignant, yet heartening book about finding courage to connect, even when you feel scared and alone. This edition features optional audio narration for compatible ebook readers. There will be times when you walk into a room and no one there is quite like you. There are many reasons to feel different. Maybe it''s how you look or talk, or where you''re from; maybe it''s what you eat, or something just as random. It''s not easy to take those first steps into a place where nobody really knows you yet, but somehow you do it. Jacqueline Woodson''s lyrical text and Rafael López''s dazzling art reminds us that we all feel like outsiders sometimes-and how brave it is that we go forth anyway. And that sometimes, when we reach out and begin to share our stories, others will be happy to meet us halfway. (This book is also available in Spanish, as El Día En Que Descubres Quién Eres!)

A lyrical story of star-crossed love perfect for readers of The Hate U Give, by National Ambassador for Children’s Literature Jacqueline Woodson--now celebrating its twentieth anniversary, and including a new preface by the author Jeremiah feels good inside his own skin. That is, when he''s in his own Brooklyn neighborhood. But now he''s going to be attending a fancy prep school in Manhattan, and black teenage boys don''t exactly fit in there. So it''s a surprise when he meets Ellie the first week of school. In one frozen moment their eyes lock, and after that they know they fit together--even though she''s Jewish and he''s black. Their worlds are so different, but to them that''s not what matters. Too bad the rest of the world has to get in their way. Jacqueline Woodson''s work has been called “moving and resonant” (Wall Street Journal) and “gorgeous” (Vanity Fair). If You Come Softly is a powerful story of interracial love that leaves readers wondering "why" and "if only . . ."

NATIONAL BOOK AWARD WINNER • NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • The acclaimed author of Red at the Bone tells the moving story of her childhood in mesmerizing poems. A NEWBERY HONOR BOOK • WINNER OF THE CORETTA SCOTT KING BOOK AWARD • A KIRKUS REVIEWS BEST MIDDLE GRADE BOOK OF THE CENTURY “Moving and resonant . . . captivating.”—The Wall Street Journal I am born in Ohio but the stories of South Carolina already run like rivers through my veins. Raised in South Carolina and New York, Jacqueline Woodson always felt halfway home in each place. In vivid poems, she shares what it was like to grow up as an African American in the 1960s and 70s, living with the remnants of Jim Crow and her growing awareness of the Civil Rights movement. Touching and powerful, each poem is both accessible and emotionally charged, providing a glimpse into a child’s soul as she finds her voice through writing and searches for her place in the world. Teeming with feeling and deeply personal, Brown Girl Dreaming is the groundbreaking chronicle of Woodson’s journey to storytelling, and a beautiful portrayal of physical, emotional, and spiritual growth.

Ada Ruth''s mama must go away to Chicago to work, leaving Ada Ruth and Grandma behind. It''s war time, and women are needed to fill the men''s jobs. As winter sets in, Ada Ruth and her grandma keep up their daily routine, missing Mama all the time. They find strength in each other, and a stray kitten even arrives one day to keep them company, but nothing can fill the hole Mama left. Every day they wait, watching for the letter that says Mama will be coming on home soon. Set during World War II, Coming On Home Soon has a timeless quality that will appeal to all who wait and hope.

A lyrical coming-of-age story from a three-time Newbery Honor winning author Thirteen-year-old Staggerlee used to be called Evangeline, but she took on a fiercer name. She''s always been different--set apart by the tragic deaths of her grandparents in an anti-civil rights bombing, by her parents'' interracial marriage, and by her family''s retreat from the world. This summer she has a new reason to feel set apart--her confused longing for her friend Hazel. When cousin Trout comes to stay, she gives Staggerlee a first glimpse of her possible future selves and the world beyond childhood.

Twelve-year-old Marie is a leader among the popular black girls in Chauncey, Ohio, a prosperous black suburb. She isn''t looking for a friend when Lena Bright, a white girl, appears in school. Yet they are drawn to each other because both have lost their mothers. And they know how to keep a secret. For Lena has a secret that is terrifying, and she''s desperate to protect herself and her younger sister from their father. Marie must decide whether she can help Lena by keeping her secret... or by telling it.

Jacqueline Woodson and Rafael López''s highly anticipated companion to their #1 New York Times bestseller The Day You Begin illuminates the power in each of us to face challenges with confidence. On a dreary, stuck-inside kind of day, a brother and sister heed their grandmother’s advice: “Use those beautiful and brilliant minds of yours. Lift your arms, close your eyes, take a deep breath, and believe in a thing. Somebody somewhere at some point was just as bored you are now.” And before they know it, their imaginations lift them up and out of their boredom. Then, on a day full of quarrels, it’s time for a trip outside their minds again, and they are able to leave their anger behind. This precious skill, their grandmother tells them, harkens back to the days long before they were born, when their ancestors showed the world the strength and resilience of their beautiful and brilliant minds. Jacqueline Woodson’s lyrical text and Rafael Lopez’s dazzling art celebrate the extraordinary ability to lift ourselves up and imagine a better world.

WINNER OF THE NAACP IMAGE AWARD WINNER OF THE CORETTA SCOTT KING AUTHOR AWARD National Book Award winner Jacqueline Woodson''s stirring novel-in-verse explores how a family moves forward when their glory days have passed and the cost of professional sports on Black bodies. For as long as ZJ can remember, his dad has been everyone''s hero. As a charming, talented pro football star, he''s as beloved to the neighborhood kids he plays with as he is to his millions of adoring sports fans. But lately life at ZJ''s house is anything but charming. His dad is having trouble remembering things and seems to be angry all the time. ZJ''s mom explains it''s because of all the head injuries his dad sustained during his career. ZJ can understand that--but it doesn''t make the sting any less real when his own father forgets his name. As ZJ contemplates his new reality, he has to figure out how to hold on tight to family traditions and recollections of the glory days, all the while wondering what their past amounts to if his father can''t remember it. And most importantly, can those happy feelings ever be reclaimed when they are all so busy aching for the past?

Two children’s book superstars—#1 New York Times bestseller Jacqueline Woodson, the author of The Day You Begin, and Leo Espinosa, the illustrator of Islandbornu00ad—join forces to celebrate the joy and freedom of summer in the city, which is gloriously captured in their rhythmic text and lively art. One of The Atlantic’s 65 Essential Children’s Books It''s getting hot outside, hot enough to turn on the hydrants and run through the water--and that means it''s finally summer in the city! Released from school and reveling in their freedom, the kids on one Brooklyn block take advantage of everything summertime has to offer: Freedom from morning till night to go out to meet their friends and make the streets their playground--jumping double Dutch, playing tag and hide-and-seek, building forts, chasing ice cream trucks, and best of all, believing anything is possible. That is, till their moms call them home for dinner. But not to worry--they know there is always tomorrow to do it all over again--because the block belongs to them and they rule their world. (This book is also available in Spanish, as El mundo era nuestro!)

Laurel Daneau has moved on to a new life, in a new town, but inside she''s still reeling from the loss of her beloved mother and grandmother after Hurricane Katrina washed away their home. Laurel''s new life is going well, with a new best friend, a place on the cheerleading squad and T-Boom, co-captain of the basketball team, for a boyfriend. Yet Laurel is haunted by voices and memories from her past. When T-Boom introduces Laurel to meth, she immediately falls under its spell, loving the way it erases, even if only briefly, her past. But as she becomes alienated from her friends and family, she becomes a shell of her former self, and longs to be whole again. With help from an artist named Moses and her friend Kaylee, she''s able to begin to rewrite her story and start to move on from her addiction. Incorporating Laurel''s bittersweet memories of life before and during the hurricane, this is a stunning novel by one of our finest writers. Jacqueline Woodson''s haunting - but ultimately hopeful - story is beautifully told and one readers will not want to miss.

In this moving picture book from multi-award winning author Jacqueline Woodson, a young girl and her grandmother prepare for a very special day--the one day a month they get to visit the girl''s father in prison. "Only on visiting day is there chicken frying in the kitchen at 6 a.m, and Grandma in her Sunday dress, humming soft and low." As the little girl and her grandmother get ready, her father, who adores her, is getting ready, too, and readers get to join the community of families who make the trip together, as well as the triumphant reunion between father and child, all told in Woodson''s trademark lyrical style, and beautifully illusrtrated by James Ransome.

Margaret and Maizon are back together on Madison Street, but their friendship is different now. Margaret needs more time alone, and it''s not just the two of them any more-their new neighbor and classmate, Caroline, has become part of their lives. But that seems minor next to what is about to happen to Maizon. . . . "Woodson''s candid assessments of relations between blacks and whites are as searching as ever, and her characters just as commanding." (Publishers Weekly)

An intriguing look at teen pregnancy from a three-time Newbery Honor winning author Feni is furious when she finds out that her mother has agreed to take a fifteen-year-old pregnant girl into their home until her baby is born. What kind of girl would let herself get into so much trouble? How can Feni live under the same roof as someone like that? Her worst fears are confirmed when Rebecca arrives: she is mean, bossy, and uneducated. Feni decided she will have nothing to do with her. But it’s hard not to be curious about a girl so close to her own age who seems so different…

Three-time Newbery Honor author Jacqualine Woodson explores race and sexuality through the eyes of a compelling narrator Melanin Sun has a lot to say. But sometimes it''s hard to speak his mind, so he fills up notebooks with his thoughts instead. He writes about his mom a lot--they''re about as close as they can be, because they have no other family. So when she suddenly tells him she''s gay, his world is turned upside down. And if that weren''t hard enough for him to accept, her girlfriend is white. Melanin Sun is angry and scared. How can his mom do this to him--is this the end of their closeness? What will his friends think? And can he let her girlfriend be part of their family?

Margaret loves her parents and hanging out with her best friend, Maizon. Then it happens, like a one-two punch, during the summer she turns eleven: first, Margaret''s father dies of a heart attack, and then Maizon is accepted at an expensive boarding school, far away from the city they call home. For the first time in her life, Margaret has to turn to someone who isn''t Maizon, who doesn''t know her heart and her dreams. . . . "Ms. Woodson writes with a sure understanding of the thoughts of young people, offering a poetic, eloquent narrative that is not simply a story of nearly adolescent children, but a mature exploration of grown-up issues: death, racism, independence, the nurturing of the gifted black child and, most important, self-discovery."(The New York Times)

A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER A NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK OF THE YEAR "A spectacular novel that only this legend can pull off." -Ibram X. Kendi, #1 New York Times-bestselling author of HOW TO BE AN ANTIRACIST, in The Atlantic "An exquisite tale of family legacy….The power and poetry of Woodson’s writing conjures up Toni Morrison." – People "In less than 200 sparsely filled pages, this book manages to encompass issues of class, education, ambition, racial prejudice, sexual desire and orientation, identity, mother-daughter relationships, parenthood and loss….With Red at the Bone, Jacqueline Woodson has indeed risen — even further into the ranks of great literature." – NPR "This poignant tale of choices and their aftermath, history and legacy, will resonate with mothers and daughters." –Tayari Jones, bestselling author of AN AMERICAN MARRIAGE, in O Magazine An unexpected teenage pregnancy pulls together two families from different social classes and explores their histories – reaching back to the Tulsa race massacre of 1921 -- and exposes the private hopes, disappointments, and longings that can bind or divide us from each other, from the New York Times-bestselling and National Book Award-winning author of Another Brooklyn and Brown Girl Dreaming. Moving forward and backward in time, Jacqueline Woodson''s taut and powerful new novel uncovers the role that history and community have played in the experiences, decisions, and relationships of these families, and in the life of the new child. As the book opens in 2001, it is the evening of sixteen-year-old Melody''s coming of age ceremony in her grandparents'' Brooklyn brownstone. Watched lovingly by her relatives and friends, making her entrance to the music of Prince, she wears a special custom-made dress. But the event is not without poignancy. Sixteen years earlier, that very dress was measured and sewn for a different wearer: Melody''s mother, for her own ceremony-- a celebration that ultimately never took place. Unfurling the history of Melody''s family – reaching back to the Tulsa race massacre in 1921 -- to show how they all arrived at this moment, Woodson considers not just their ambitions and successes but also the costs, the tolls they''ve paid for striving to overcome expectations and escape the pull of history. As it explores sexual desire and identity, ambition, gentrification, education, class and status, and the life-altering facts of parenthood, Red at the Bone most strikingly looks at the ways in which young people must so often make long-lasting decisions about their lives--even before they have begun to figure out who they are and what they want to be.

Maizon takes the biggest step in her life when she accepts a scholarship to boarding school and says good-bye to her grandmother and her best friend, Margaret. Blue Hill is beautiful, and challenging-but there are only five black students, and the other four are from wealthy families. Does Maizon belong at Blue Hill after all? * "Simply told and finely crafted." (Publishers Weekly, starred review)

This novel from the National Book Award-winning author of Brown Girl Dreaming is a look back on four friends’ fifteenth year: the year that changed them all forever. Against the backdrop of a changing neighborhood and a changing world, four brown teenage girls are figuring out their lives. Their dreams of modeling, lawyering, dancing, and writing feeling very real until “the most beautiful among us” becomes pregnant. Suddenly, the world is different, more dangerous, their vulnerability more evident, and their dreams of success begin to feel like part of “another Brooklyn, a different time.”

From a four-time Newbery Honor author, a novel that was awarded the 2001 Coretta Scott King award and the Los Angeles Times Book Prize For Lafayette and his brothers, the challenges of growing up in New York City are compounded by the facts that they''ve lost their parents and it''s up to eldest brother Ty''ree to support the boys, and middle brother Charlie has just returned home from a correctional facility. Lafayette loves his brothers and would do anything if they could face the world as a team. But even though Ty''ree cares, he''s just so busy with work and responsibility. And Charlie''s changed so much that his former affection for his little brother has turned to open hostility. Now, as Lafayette approaches 13, he needs the guidance and answers only his brothers can give him. The events of one dramatic weekend force the boys to make the choice to be there for each other--to really see each other--or to give in to the pain and problems of every day.

A powerfully moving novel from a three-time Newbery Honor-winning author Evie Thomas is not who she used to be. Once she had a best friend, a happy home and a loving grandmother living nearby. Once her name was Toswiah. Now, everything is different. Her family has been forced to move to a new place and change their identities. But that''s not all that has changed. Her once lively father has become depressed and quiet. Her mother leaves teaching behind and clings to a new-found religion. Her only sister is making secret plans to leave. And Evie, struggling to find her way in a new city where kids aren''t friendly and the terrain is as unfamiliar as her name, wonders who she is. Jacqueline Woodson weaves a fascinating portrait of a thoughtful young girl''s coming of age in a world turned upside down A National Book Award Finalist