Rita Williams-Garcia

Rita Williams-Garcia (born Rita Williams; April 13, 1957) is an American writer of novels for children and young adults. In 2010, her young adult novel Jumped was a National Book Award finalist for Young People's Literature. She won the 2011 Newbery Honor Award, Coretta Scott King Award, and Scott O'Dell Award for Historical Fiction for her book One Crazy Summer. She won the PEN/Norma Klein Award. Her 2013 book, P.S. Be Eleven, was a Junior Literary Guild selection, a New York Times Editors Choice Book, In 2016 her book Gone Crazy in Alabama won the Coretta Scott King Award. In 2017, her book Clayton Byrd Goes Underground was a finalist for the National Book Award for young people's literature.

Life Williams-Garcia was born in Queens, New York. Her father was in the military. She graduated from Hofstra University in 1980, where she studied with Richard Price and Sonya Pilcer. She lives in Jamaica, New York. She taught for many years at Vermont College of Fine Arts.

Works Blue Tights, Lodestar Books, 1988, Fast Talk on a Slow Track, Dutton, 1991, ; reprint, Paw Prints, 2008, Like Sisters on the Homefront, Lodestar Books, 1995, ; reprint, Paw Prints, 2008, reprint, HarperCollins, 2002, reprint HarperCollins, 2007, reprint, HarperCollins, 2010,

P.S. Be Eleven, 2013, Gone Crazy in Alabama, 2015 Bottle Cap Boys: Dancing on Royal Street, 2015 Clayton Byrd Goes Underground, 2017 A Sitting in St. James, published in May 2021 by Quill Tree Books, an imprint of HarperCollins Children's Books,