Connie Porter

Connie Rose Porter (born July 29, 1959) is an African-American writer of young-adult books, and a teacher of creative writing. Porter is best known for her contribution to the American Girl Collection Series as the author of the Addy books: six of her Addy books have gone on to sell more than 3 million copies. In addition, she published two novels with Houghton-Mifflin, All-Bright Court, and Imani All Mine (1999).

Early life

Porter spent her childhood and youth growing up in Lackawanna, New York, a small city just outside Buffalo in the Baker Housing project with her family. Her parents, who survived the Great Depression, raised a family of ten, the children spread 23 years apart, Porter describes herself as an anxious and quiet child who liked to read, enjoying the works of Lois Lenski and Beverly Cleary.

As she became a teenager, Porter became more interested in works by black writers and about black characters. At age 14, she started writing. When she first told her mother she wanted to be a writer, Porter's mother dismissed her: "My mother didn't pay me any attention. She was cooking". However, Porter's parent's gave her a type writer as a Christmas gift when she was in 10th grade and she started to write poetry. "Inspired by her readings of Nikki Giovanni, she first wrote poetry that was angry and admittedly awful, but that was important to her growing cultural awareness".

Career All Bright Court

All Bright Court grew out of a short story assignment Porter had to do at LSU. It gave her a chance to write about the area where she grew up and the steel industry, an interest of hers. All-Bright Court is about the story of Southern Blacks who move to a Northern town to pursue greater job opportunities and a better life. It centers around the Taylor family and their neighbors living in a low-income apartment complex. However, they find out that through frequent layoffs, dangerous working conditions, their new life is not all they hoped it would be. Despite the living conditions and the new hardships they unknowingly traded for, the tenants and friends foster a sense of community. The New York Times reviewer Michiko Kakutani commented that, "Though her prose is often lyrical, even poetic, [Porter] does not shirk from showing the reader the harsh reality of her characters' daily lives. . . . Indeed, the emotional power of All-Bright Court resides in her finely rendered characters, people who come alive for the reader as individuals one has known firsthand". The books follow Addy Walker, a young slave who runs away with her mother to freedom in Philadelphia during the American Civil War. There, she grows up and faces challenges in the urban North, such as learning to read and discrimination. When Addy was introduced in 1993, over 1 million books were sold, Porter's popularity soared and more than 15,000 came to meet her. However, her plans takes an unexpected turn when she becomes pregnant after a rape. When the baby girl is born, Tasha names her daughter Imani. As she tries to raise Imani, she struggles to be a good mother in a dangerous environment filled with drugs, gangs, poverty, and bigotry while also dealing with common teenage problems such as sexuality and her mother's new white boyfriend. All-Bright Court became an American Library Association Best Book of 1991 and a New York Times Notable Book. She has sold over 4.5 million books. She received the whole Addy doll collection from American Girl because she writes the series.

Additional authors she admires are Langston Hughes, Nella Larsen, Richard Wright, Louise Meriwether, Rosa Guy, Maya Angelou, Toni Morrison, Jean Toomer, Ralph Ellison, Gabriel García Márquez, Alice Walker, Gloria Naylor, and Terry McMillan.

List of published books

All-Bright Court (1991) Meet Addy: An American Girl (1993) Addy Learns a Lesson: A school story (1993) Addy's Surprise: A Christmas story (1993) Happy Birthday, Addy!: A springtime story (1994) Addy Saves the Day: A summer story (1994) Changes for Addy: A winter story (1994) Imani All Mine (1999) High Hopes for Addy (1999) Addy's Little Brother (2000) Addy's Wedding Quilt (2001) Addy Studies Freedom (2002) Addy's Summer Place (2003)