SOURCE CITATION
"Sharon Creech." Major Authors and Illustrators for Children and Young Adults, 2nd ed., 8 vols. Gale Group, 2002. Reproduced in Biography Resource Center. Farmington Hills, Mich.: Thomson Gale. 2007.
Photograph provided by HarperCollins.

BIOGRAPHICAL ESSAY
"On February 6th, (1995)" recalled Sharon Creech in comments reprinted in Horn Book, "I was home alone in England and had been wrestling all morning with a manuscript. Feeling ornery and frustrated, I fled to our backyard to vent one of my muffled screams (muffled because I am a headmaster's wife and it isn't seemly for me to scream too loudly). In the midst of that scream, the phone rang.

"A ringing telephone in a headmaster's house often signals a crisis," she continues, "and when it rings, I'm well-trained; I grab pencil and paper. . . . That afternoon, I scribbled: American Library Association and Newbery Med. . .

"The writing trails off there."

Walk Two Moons, the 1995 Newbery Medal winner, brought Creech instant celebrity in the United States, where her first novel for young adults, Absolutely Normal Chaos, had not yet been published. "I still don't know how I feel about it," she confessed to Judy Hendershot and Jackie Peck in Reading Teacher. "It's like someone has given me this beautiful suit of Armani clothes. They look nice and everyone admires them, but I'm a little uncomfortable in them. I like to wear them for brief periods of time and then change back to my blue jeans."

Despite her years living and working in England, Creech is an American citizen. She was born and raised in Cleveland, Ohio, part of "a big, noisy family . . . with hordes of relatives telling stories around the kitchen table," she explained in the Seventh Book of Junior Authors and Illustrators. "Here I learned to exaggerate and embellish, because if you didn't, your story was drowned out by someone else's more exciting one." She was an enthusiastic writer throughout grade school and high school, and she was often captivated by the "instruments of writing: paper, pens, pencils, books. I hoarded them." She was an equally enthusiastic reader. "I don't remember the titles of books I read as a child, but I do remember the experience of reading--of drifting into the pages and living in someone else's world." "I loved myths--American Indian myths, Greek myths, and the King Arthur legends," she concluded, "--and I remember the lightning jolt of exhilaration when I read Ivanhoe as a teenager."

After receiving her bachelor's degree from Hiram College, Creech went on to George Mason University in Washington, D.C., for her master's. "During graduate school," she stated in the Seventh Book of Junior Authors and Illustrators, "I worked at the Federal Theater Project Archives and longed to write plays. Next I worked at Congressional Quarterly, as an editorial assistant, but this was not pleasant work for me, for it was all politics and facts." Nonetheless, Creech remained in Washington for several years. She married, had two children, and was divorced. In 1979, she persuaded the headmaster of TASIS (The American School in Switzerland) England School, a grade school for the children of expatriate Americans in Thorpe, England, to hire her as a teacher of literature. "Before receiving an offer of employment, however," noted Creech's husband, Lyle D. Rigg, in Horn Book, "Sharon had to convince the

headmaster that she, a single parent with two young children, could handle the considerable demands of teaching in an international day/boarding school in the suburbs of London. Although I have never read Sharon's letter to that headmaster, I have heard that it was a masterpiece of persuasion and was instrumental in getting her hired."

Creech and Rigg were married about three years after they met. "I think it was a combination of our Buckeye roots and ice cubes that drew us together," Rigg recalled. "We met on our first day in England, when Sharon borrowed some ice--that rare commodity in Europe--from me." Rigg had been hired as assistant headmaster--the British equivalent of a school principal--and soon after he and Creech were married, they were transferred to the TASIS branch in Switzerland. In 1984, Rigg returned to Thorpe as headmaster of the English branch, and he and Creech have been there ever since (although they spend their summers in a cabin in Chautauqua, New York). "As a teacher of American and British literature to American and international teenagers," Rigg added, "Sharon has shared her love both of literature and of writing. She'd open up Chaucer's world in The Canterbury Tales and then head off to Canterbury with her students so that they could make the pilgrimage themselves. She'd offer Hamlet, and then off they would all go to Stratford-upon-Avon."

For many years Creech devoted her time almost exclusively to her teaching and her family. "In 1980, when my children and I had been in England for nine months," she recalled in Horn Book, "my father had a stroke. Although he lived for six more years, the stroke left him paralyzed and unable to speak. . . . Think of all those words locked up for six years. . . ." Creech started her first novel a month after her father's death in 1986, "and when I finished it," she continued, "I wrote another, and another, and another. The words rushed out."

Absolutely Normal Chaos, Creech's first book for young readers, was published in England in 1990. "When I wrote Absolutely Normal Chaos, " Creech told Hendershot and Peck, "I didn't know it was a children's book." Absolutely Normal Chaos deals with a variety of themes, some specific to adolescence (first love, growing up, schoolwork), and others that can apply to any period in life (dealing with relatives and friends, learning compassion and understanding). The book is the journal of one summer in the life of thirteen-year-old Mary Lou Finney of Easton, Ohio. At the beginning of the book Mary Lou begs her English teacher not to read the remainder of the story. Her summer, it becomes apparent, has been more bizarre than usual. "Her life is disrupted in more ways than one by the arrival of a gangling, uncommunicative cousin, Carl Ray, from West Virginia, by his curious relationship with Charlie Furtz, the genial neighbour from across the road, who subsequently dies of a heart attack, and by her own budding romance with Alex Cheevey," explained Joan Zahnleiter in Magpies. These circumstances force Mary Lou to confront issues in her own life and to come to terms with her own family and its functionings. Throughout her summer, Mary Lou learns to confront such diverse issues as classic literature, death, questionable legitimacy, and family life. "Mary Lou is a typical teen whose acquaintance with the sadder parts of life is cushioned by a warm and energetic family," stated Cindy Darling Codell in her School Library Journal review. "Her entertaining musings on Homer, Shakespeare, and Robert Frost are drawn in nifty parallels to what is happening in her own life." Nancy Vasilakis of Horn Book added: "Her own hilarious brush with culture shock occurs when she accompanies Carl Ray on a trip to his home. This visit also provides Mary Lou with some insights into what her cousin has had to endure at her house. Mary Lou grows in a number of important ways throughout the summer, and the metaphors she now recognizes in the Odyssey could, she realizes, very well apply to her own life."

The same themes of growth and self-recognition appear in Creech's second novel (the first published in the United States), Walk Two Moons. In this story, Salamanca Tree Hiddle, another thirteen-year-old girl like Mary Lou, relates the plight of her friend Phoebe, whose mother has left home. What makes Phoebe's story particularly relevant to Sal is the fact that Sal's mother Sugar also left home and never returned. Sal is on a trip to Idaho with her grandparents to visit her mother. "Sal finds that recounting Phoebe's story helps her understand the desertion of her own mother," explained Deborah Stevenson in the Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books. "Creech skillfully keeps these layers separate but makes their interrelationship clear, and the plot moves along amid all this contemplation with the aid of a mysterious noteleaver, a local 'lunatic,' an eccentric English teacher, and Sal's budding romance."

Some of the elements of Walk Two Moons came from Creech's own experiences. "In every book I've done," she told Hendershot and Peck, "the characters are combinations of people. I do draw very much from my family, and so I've speculated that Salamanca and her mother are very much me and my own daughter combined." Creech explained that the idea that originally inspired the writing of Walk Two Moons came from a message she found in a fortune cookie: "Don't judge a man until you've walked two moons in his moccasins." The framework of the story was based on Creech's trip to Lewiston, Idaho with her family at the age of twelve. Sal's Native American ancestry was also inspired by the author's childhood experiences. "I inhaled Indian myths, and among my favorites were those which involved stories of reincarnation," she commented in her Newbery acceptance speech. "How magnificent and mysterious to be Estsanatlehi, 'the woman who never dies. She grows from baby to mother to old woman and then turns into a baby again, and on and on she goes, living a thousand, thousand lives.' I wanted to be that Navajo woman."

Sal's full name, Salamanca Tree, also evokes Creech's fondness for the outdoors. "I think I spent half my childhood up a tree," she recalled in Horn Book. "You could climb and climb, and you could reach a place where there was only you and the tree and the birds and the sky. And maybe the appeal of trees also lay in the sense that they live 'a thousand, thousand lives,' appearing to die each autumn." "The Indianness is one of the best things about this book," asserted New York Times Book Review contributor Hazel Rochman, "casual, contemporary and mythic, not an exotic thing apart. Sal is only a small part Indian, and she knows her parents gave her what they thought was the tribe's name but got it wrong. Still, the heritage is a part of her identity. She loves the Indian stories her mother told her, and they get mixed in with Genesis and Pandora's box and Longfellow and with family stories and, above all, with a celebration of the sweeping natural world and our connectedness with it." "For once in a children's book," Rochman concluded, "Indians are people, not reverential figures in a museum diorama. Sal's Indian heritage is a natural part of her finding herself in America."

One of the most dramatic themes common to both Absolutely Normal Chaos and Walk Two Moons is that of death, which is examined in relation to subsequent feelings of grief and loss. Mary Lou and Carl Ray have to come to terms with the loss of Charlie Furtz. Sal has to deal with death and her own sense of desertion and loss. These themes are also linked to Creech's life. "When I read Salamanca's story now, with some distance," the author revealed in Horn Book, "I hear such longing in her voice--for her mother, for her father, for the land--and I know that her longing is also my longing . . . for my children, my larger family, and for my own country."

Creech's next story, Pleasing the Ghost, directed to a somewhat younger audience, also deals with death and loss, but with a lighter touch. Nine-year-old Dennis is visited in his bedroom by a parade of ghosts--"but never the one I want." Hoping to encounter his late father, Dennis instead meets up with his Uncle Arvie, who wants the boy to help Arvie's widow, Dennis's Aunt Julia, find gifts and money he has left hidden for her. Mystery blends with comedy in Creech's tale as Dennis must first decipher his uncle's messages, jumbled due to a speech impairment caused by a stroke Arvie suffered before his death. "The book has several mythical elements: three wishes, magic, ghosts, a lonely young boy whose father has died, a quest and a satisfactory conclusion," asserted School Librarian contributor Ann Jenkin. A Publishers Weekly reviewer observed: "Arvie's earnest affection for Julia and Dennis make him a role model as well as a clown, and Creech's attention to nuances of feeling grounds this light tale in emotional truth." Booklist reviewer Michael Cart called Pleasing the Ghost an "engaging story that manages to deal lightheartedly with emotional loss by offering (Creech's) readers the enduring promise of hope."

Creech returns to the hills of Kentucky, the setting for the opening of Walk Two Moons, for Chasing Redbird, another well-received story of grief, loss, and discovery. Thirteen-year-old Zinnia Taylor, the third of seven siblings, enjoys escaping to the "Quiet Zone" of her neighboring aunt and uncle's home. The death of Zinny's aunt, however, causes her despondent uncle to engage in increasingly eccentric behavior as he succumbs to unrelenting grief, leaving Zinny to find solace elsewhere. The teenager soon becomes obsessed with her discovery of a long, winding trail near her home--a trail once used by trappers and Indians. As Zinny works to clear the trail, occasionally interrupted by the attentions of an older boy, she unearths markers and other indications of her ancestors' presence in the region. "Creech has written a striking novel, notable for its emotional honesty," declared Ethel L. Heins in a Horn Book review of Chasing Redbird. "In her Newbery Medal acceptance speech," Heins added, "the author spoke of her predilection for mystery and for metaphorical journeys; she has worked both into the novel and, in addition, once again bridges the gap between the generations and binds them together." A Kirkus Reviews commentator also had high praise for the book, maintaining: "Creech crams her novel full of wonderful characters, proficient dialogue, bracing descriptions, and a merry use of language." A Publishers Weekly reviewer called Chasing Redbird "Creech's best yet," while Deborah Stevenson of the Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books concluded: "Creech again demonstrates her expertise at evoking physical and emotional landscapes and the connections between the two as Zinny blazes her way down literal and spiritual paths."

In Love That Dog Creech tells the story of Jack, a young boy who grows to love poetry after initially refusing to read it. The work of Walter Dean Myers especially appeals to him, and finally moves Jack to write the poet a letter. Myers' poetry helps Jack to write his own poetry, and to come to terms with the death of his beloved dog, Sky. Andrea Sachs in Time called the book "deceptively simple and never preachy." Using a living poet as a character in her novel made Creech uneasy, but her editor sent a copy of the manuscript to Myers to see what he thought of the story. "He gave his blessing. . . .," Creech told an interviewer for School Library Journal. "If he hadn't said that, there would be no book."

Speaking of her career, an essayist for the St. James Guide to Young Adult Writers commented that "Creech is a writer whose talent draws her audience into situations which make dealing with some of the harsher vicissitudes of life seem not only possible but inviting. Though her characters must contend with a litany of coming-of-age motifs--budding sexuality and first loves, coming to terms with death and grief, illegitimacy, sibling rivalry, uncomfortable issues of self-recognition, and parents who for one reason or another are not part of their children's lives--Creech's understanding of loss and love and the importance of connections with other people draws readers into the characters' lives in the most sympathetic way. It is a testament to this writer's skill in approaching such serious issues with insight and humor that readers who enter these narratives emerge from the reading saying they enjoyed Creech's characters and stories."

UPDATES
July 11, 2003: Creech wins Great Britain's 2003 Carnegie Medal from the Chartered Institute of Library Professionals for Ruby Holler. Source: BBC, http://news.bbc.co.uk, July 11, 2003.

July 18, 2005: Creech's novel Walk Two Moons was adapted for the stage by Julia Jordan. The play premiered in July at the Lucille Lortel Theater in New York, and was the first production by the newly formed Theaterworks/NYC group. Source: New York Times, www.nytimes.com, July 19, 2005.

PERSONAL INFORMATION
Born July 29, 1945, in Cleveland, OH; married H. R. Leuthy, Jr., 1967 (divorced, 1977); married Lyle D. Rigg (headmaster at TASIS England American School, Thorpe, Surrey), 1981; children: (first marriage) Rob, Karin. Education: Hiram College, B.A.; George Mason University, M.A. Addresses: Home--c/o TASIS England, Coldharbour Lane, Thorpe, Surrey, England; and Chautauqua, NY. Agent--Carol Smith and Jonathan Dolger.

CAREER
Federal Theater Project Archives, Fairfax, VA; editorial assistant, Congressional Quarterly, Washington, DC; teacher of American and British literature, TASIS England American School, Surrey, England, 1979-82, and 1984-94, and TASIS (The American School in Switzerland), Lugano, Switzerland, 1983-85.