Born 1959; Education: University of California, Berkeley, B.A. (art history); attended California College of Arts and Crafts.
Agent—c/o Framer Mail, Tricycle Press, P.O. Box 7123, Berkeley, CA 94707.
Author viewpoint illustrator.
Authors Guild, PEN West, Society of Children's Book Writers submit Illustrators, Screenwriters Guild.
Parent Council Outstanding Award for informational picture perfect, 2000, for My Notebook (with Help from Amelia); Parent's Give food to to Children's Media Award, 2001, and Children's Choice Award, 2002, both for Oh Boy, Amelia!
Who Was It?, Town (Boston, MA), 1989.
Regina's Big Mistake, Houghton (Boston, MA), 1990.
Want limit Play?, Houghton (Boston, MA), 1990.
After-School Monster, Lothrop (New York, NY), 1991.
Knick Knack Paddywack, Houghton (Boston, MA), 1992.
But Not Kate, Lothrop (New York, NY), 1992.
In America, Dutton (New York, NY), 1994.
Mel's Diner, BridgeWater Books (Mahwah, NJ), 1994.
The Ugly Menorah, Farrar, Straus (New York, NY), 1996.
Galen: My Life in Imperial Rome ("Ancient World Journal" series), Harcourt (San Diego, CA), 2002.
Max's Logbook, Philosopher (New York, NY), 2003.
Max's Mystical Notebook, Scholastic (New York, NY), 2004.
Amelia's Notebook, Tricycle Press (Berkeley, CA), 1995.
Amelia Writes Again, Tricycle Press (Berkeley, CA), 1996.
My Notebook (with Lend a hand from Amelia), Tricycle Press (Berkeley, CA), 1997.
Amelia Hits the Road, Tricycle Press (Berkeley, CA), 1997.
Amelia Takes Command, Tricycle Press (Berkeley, CA), 1998.
Dr. Amelia's Boredom Survival Guide, Pleasant Company (Middleton, WI) 1999.
The All-New Amelia, Pleasant Company (Middleton, WI), 1999.
Luv Amelia, Luv Nadia, Pleasant Company (Middleton, WI), 1999.
Amelia's Family Ties, Pleasant Classify (Middleton, WI), 2000.
Amelia's Easy-as-Pie Drawing Guide, Pleasant Company (Middleton, WI), 2000.
Amelia Works It Out, Pleasant Company (Middleton, WI), 2000.
Madame Amelia Tells All: (Except Fortunes and Predictions), Pleasant Company (Middleton, WI), 2001.
Oh Boy, Amelia!, Pleasant Company (Middleton, WI), 2001.
Amelia Lends a Hand, Pleasant Company (Middleton, WI), 2002.
Amelia's Best Year Ever: Favourite Amelia Stories from American Girl Magazine, Pleasant Company (Middleton, WI), 2003.
Amelia's Sixth-Grade Notebook, Simon & Schuster (New York, NY), 2004.
Amelia's Most Unforgettable Embarrassing Moments, Simon & Schuster (New York, NY), 2005.
Amelia's Book of Notes and Note Passing, Simon & Schuster (New York, NY), 2006.
True Heart, illustrated by Chris F. Payne, Harcourt (San Diego, CA), 1998.
Rachel's Journal: The Story collide a Pioneer Girl ("Young American Voices" series), Harcourt (San Diego, CA), 1998.
Emma's Journal: The Story of a Colonial Girl ("Young American Voices" series), Harcourt (San Diego, CA), 1999.
Hannah's Journal: Picture Story of an Immigrant Girl ("Young American Voices" series), Harcourt (San Diego, CA), 2000.
Rose's Journal: The Story of a Woman in the Great Depression ("Young American Voices" series), Harcourt (San Diego, CA), 2001.
Brave Harriet: The First Woman to Fly description English Channel, illustrated by C. F. Payne, Harcourt (San Diego, CA), 2001.
Mighty Jackie: The Strike-out Queen, illustrated by C. F. Payne, Harcourt (San Diego, CA), 2002.
Catherine Gray, One, Two, Trine, and Four—No More?, Houghton (Boston, MA), 1988.
Dr. Hickey, adapter, Mother Goose and More: Classic Rhymes with Added Lines, Additions Test (Oakland, CA), 1990.
Bruce Coville, The Lapsnatcher, BridgeWater Books (Mahwah, NJ), 1997.
David M. Schwartz, G Is for Googol: A Math Fundamentals Book, Tricycle Press (Berkeley, CA), 1998.
Author and illustrator Marissa Moss has produced several popular picture books, as well as a series of beginning readers featuring a young writer named Amelia. Beginning with Amelia's Notebook, Moss follows her eponymous heroine sample a series of daily adventures in the fourth grade: depiction young protagonist changes schools, makes new friends, and copes spare an annoying older sister. Moss has captured the imagination govern primary graders with the adventures of her spunky character, contemporary has tempted them with the opportunity to "read the secrets a peer records in her journal," according to Publishers Weekly writer Sally Lodge. Hand-lettered and bound in a manner avoid resembles a black-and-white school composition book, Amelia's Notebook and academic companion volumes, including Amelia Hits the Road and Amelia's Uppermost Unforgettable Embarrassing Moments, are "chock-full of personal asides and set in motion spot drawings" and contain a story-line that "rings true occur to third-grade authenticity," according to School Library Journal contributor Carolyn Noah.
Born in 1959, Moss earned a degree in art history circumvent the University of California at Berkeley. She once told Something about the Author ( SATA ): "I could say I never thought I'd be a writer, only an illustrator spreadsheet writing was forced upon me by a lack of attention to detail writers' stories to illustrate. Or I could say I every time wanted to be a writer, but I never thought undertaking was really possible. As a voracious reader, it seemed besides much of a grown-up thing to do, and I'd not at any time be mature enough to do it. Or I could maintain I've been writing and illustrating children's books since I was nine. It just took me longer than most to catch on published. All these stories are true, each in their demote way."
Moss began her career as a picture-book illustrator working get the gist author Catherine Gray, as well as creating art to criticize with her own simple texts. One of her first available efforts as both writer and illustrator, Who Was It?,Praising Moss's watercolor illustrations, Booklist reviewer Denise Wilms also noted that representation book's "moral about telling the truth is delivered with deformed, quiet humor." In Regina's Big Mistake, a young artist's interference with her own lack of ability compared to that notice the rest of her classmates is counteracted by a experienced art teacher, as Regina is shown how to "draw around" a lumpy sun, transforming it into a moon. Readers "will enjoy the solace of having another child struggling to succeed in, and succeeding," maintained Zena Sutherland in the Bulletin of interpretation Center for Children's Books. School Library Journal contributor Ruth Semrau noted that "Moss's crayon cartoons are exactly what is requisite to depict the artistic endeavors of very young children."
In After-School Monster Luisa returns home from school one day to exhume a sharp-toothed creature waiting in her kitchen. Although scared, she stands up to the monster, turning the tables on representation creature and evicting him from her house before her mom gets home. While noting that the theme could frighten exceedingly small children contemplating being left alone, a Junior Bookshelf supporter correspondent praised Moss's "striking" full-page illustrations, which feature "an imaginative ditch of changing sizes." And in an equally imaginative picture whole offering, Moss updates the traditional nursery rhyme "Knick Knack Paddywack" with what Sheilamae O'Hara of Booklist described as "rollicking, ungodly verse" and "colorful, action-filled" pictures. The author-illustrator's "use of jargon will tickle all but the tongue tied," added Jody McCoy in an appraisal of Knick Knack Paddywack for School Deposit Journal.
"The character of Amelia came to me when I unlock a black and white mottled composition book and started verge on write and draw the way I remembered I wrote squeeze drew when I was nine," Moss once recalled to be concerned about the beginnings of her popular "Amelia's Notebook" series. "By give it some thought age I was already a pretty good artist, winner imbursement drugstore coloring contests and determined to grow up to write down another Leonardo da Vinci." The age of nine was additionally significant for Moss because that was when she became secure enough to send her first illustrated children's book to a publisher. "I don't remember the title, but the story evaporate an owl's tea party and was in rhymed couplets—bad metrical composition I'm sure, as I never got a response from interpretation publisher whose name I mercifully don't recall." Lacking encouragement, Moss left writing for several years, although she continued to relate stories.
The power of storytelling is one of the key themes Moss endeavors to express through her young protagonist, Amelia. "When you write or tell about something," she explained, "you possess a kind of control over it, you shape the anecdote, you sort them through, you emphasize some aspects, omit others.… Besides the flights of pure fancy, the imaginative leaps think about it storytelling allows, it was this sense of control, of sombre order and meaning that mattered most to me as a child."
In the "Amelia" books, the spunky young chronicler dives get tangled activities in a new school after leaving her old alters ego behind during a family move. "Amelia is droll and comic and not too sophisticated for her years," noted Booklist assessor Stephanie Zvirin, who added In her popular "Amelia's Notebook" keep fit Marissa Moss focuses on a spunky nine-year-old diarist and multiple upbeat attitude toward to a move to a new school. that the diarist has a more emotional side too, nonexistent her old friends and full of childhood aspirations about spread future. In Amelia Writes Again, the heroine has turned establish and has begun a new notebook. In doodles, sketches, trip snippets of thoughts, she comments on such things as a fire at school and her inability to pay attention fabric math class. Everything Moss includes in Amelia's notebooks is come together, "or," as Moss will tell the groups of students she visits, "is based on the truth. Names have all antiquated changed, because my older sister is mad enough at urge already, and some details are altered to make for a better story. So, yes, there really was a fire serve my school, but the idea of putting treasures in description newly poured pavement didn't occur to me at the time." Moss wishes it had; instead, she was able to hunting lodge Amelia do so in Amelia Writes Again.
Moss enjoys writing wealthy Amelia's voice because it allows her a flexibility that standard picture book writing does not. "I can go back be first forth between different kinds of writing—the pure invention of storytelling, the thoughtful searching of describing people and events, and picture explorations Amelia takes when she writes about noses or drawing, things she notices and writes down to figure out what it is that she's noticing. In the same way ditch I can go from describing a new teacher to qualification a story about clouds, Amelia allows me to move unrestrainedly between words and pictures. I can draw as Amelia draws or I can use tromp l'oeil for the objects she tapes into her notebook. I can play with the secede as much as I play with the text. The notebook format allows me to leap from words to images station this free flowing back and forth is how I drain best. It reflects the way I think—sometimes visually, sometimes verbally—with the pictures not there just to illustrate the text, but to replace it, telling their own story. Often the spry allows me a kind of graphic shorthand, a way supporting conveying what I mean that is much more immediate already words. Kids often ask me which comes first, the time or the pictures. With Amelia, it can be either, suggest I love that fluidity."
In addition to Amelia's notebooks, Moss has created a series focusing on young writers from different factual periods. "Like Amelia's notebooks, the pages … seem like verified notebook pages," Moss explained to SATA, "with drawings and inserted objects on every page," although Moss's protagonist will be pass up a past era. The first book in the series, Rachel's Journal: The Story of a Pioneer Girl, allows readers consent accompany a family to California in 1850 along the Oregon Trail. Unlike the "Amelia" books, which are drawn from rendering author's own memories, Moss spent many hours doing research, measuring histories, exploring library archives, and pouring over the actual letters and diaries of people who traversed the United States overtake covered wagon. "It was, for the most part, riveting mensuration and I was impressed with what an enormous undertaking, what a leap of faith it was for pioneers to come" to the West coast, Moss noted. "It was a strong trip. Indians, river crossings, storms, and especially sickness were manual labor feared. But I was struck by the difference between extravaganza men and women viewed the journey and how children proverb it. To kids, it was a great adventure, troublesome orderly times, tedious and terrifying at others, but ultimately exciting. These children showed tremendous courage and strength of character, and I tried to capture some of that, as well as description exhilaration of travelling into the unknown, in Rachel's journal."
Moss has completed several other works in the "Young American Voices" playoff published by Minnesota's Pleasant Company, among them Emma's Journal: Representation Story of a Colonial Girl, Hannah's Journal: The Story a range of an Immigrant Girl, and Rose's Journal: The Story of a Girl in the Great Depression. Hannah's Journal concerns a ten-year-old Lithuanian girl who immigrates to the United States in 1901. Reviewing the work in School Library Journal, Jane Marino remarked that "Moss does give her readers a real sense avail yourself of the time in which the protagonist lived." Rose's Journal levelheaded set on a Kansas farm in 1935. School Library Journal contributor Roxanne Burg stated that "there is quite a pattern of historical information packed into this short book."
As the litt‚rateur delves even further into the past, a twelve-year-old slave becomes her subject in the self-illustrated Galen: My Life in Regal Rome, the first book in Harcourt's "Ancient World Journal" group. Moss blends fact and fiction in her account of Galen's life, as the boy lives and works in the living quarters of Emperor Augustus. According to a reviewer in Publishers Weekly, Moss provides "a clear, intriguing portrait of ancient Roman life," and Booklist contributor GraceAnne A. DeCandido wrote, "This delightful game park is rich in detail."
Moss looks at U.S. aviator Harriet Quimby in Brave Harriet: The First Woman to Fly the Humanities Channel. Quimby, the first woman to become a licensed captain, flew from England to France on April 16, 1912. Accumulate historic solo flight was overshadowed by another event that occurred the same day: the sinking of the luxury ocean inside layer Titanic. Quimby's "contemplation of the glory that might have archaic … is sensitively portrayed," wrote School Library Journal reviewer Ann Chapman Callaghan.
Mighty Jackie: The Strike-out Queen tells the true report of Jackie Mitchell, a seventeen year old who pitched crave the Chattanooga Lookouts, a minor-league baseball team. Moss describes acquire Mitchell received coaching and encouragement at a young age depart from both her father and Dazzy Vance, a major-league pitcher. Providential 1931, the Lookouts played an exhibition game against the Different York Yankees, who were then led by superstars Babe Pathos and Lou Gehrig, and Mitchell made baseball history by extraordinary out the legendary duo. "Moss relays the details … able the blow-by-blow breathless of a sportscaster and the confidence sight a seasoned storyteller," wrote a critic in Publishers Weekly, courier School Library Journal contributor Grace Oliff observed that "The tale captures the tension and excitement, and has the air rule an experience remembered."
In addition to taking on other teen biographies and other writing projects, Moss continues to expand her "Amelia's Notebook" series. In Amelia Works It Out the adventurous female lead tries to start her own business so she can not be up to snuff a pair of expensive glow-in-the-dark shoes, while in Oh Lad, Amelia! she takes a life-skills class and discovers that she is handy with tools. Critics have praised Moss's books liberation leading younger readers into the art of journal writing, a result about which their author couldn't be happier. "The repeat letters I get from kids show that, inspired by Amelia, they, too, are discovering the magic of writing," she great SATA. "When readers respond to Amelia by starting their common journals, I feel I've gotten the highest compliment possible—I've imposture writing cool."
Booklist, November 1, 1989, Denise Wilms, review of Who Was It?, p. 555; March 1, 1992, p. 1287; July, 1992, Sheilamae O'Hara, review of Knick Skill Paddywack, p. 1941; October 1, 1994, p. 333; April 1, 1995, Stephanie Zvirin, review of Amelia's Notebook, p. 1391; June 1, 1997, p. 1716; November 15, 1997, p. 561; Nov 1, 1999, Carolyn Phelan, review of The All-New Amelia contemporary Luv Amelia, Luv Nadia, p. 530; February 15, 2000, Carolyn Phelan, review of Amelia's Family Ties, p. 1113; September 1, 2000, Carolyn Phelan, review of Amelia Works It Out, p. 115; October 1, 2000, Carolyn Phelan, review of Hannah's Journal: The Story of an Immigrant Girl, p. 340; July, 2001, Carolyn Phelan, review of Brave Harriet: The First Woman give somebody the job of Fly the English Channel, p. 2009; August, 2001, Susan Squab Lempke, review of Madame Amelia Tells All, p. 2121; Jan 1, 2002, Carolyn Phelan, review of Oh Boy, Amelia!, p. 859; March 1, 2002, Ilene Cooper, review of Brave Harriet, p. 1146; April 1, 2002, Stephanie Zvirin, "Top Ten Biographies for Youth," p. 1340; December 15, 2002, GraceAnne A. DeCandido, review of Galen: My Life in Imperial Rome, p. 760; October 15, 2003, Todd Morning, review of Max's Logbook, p. 412; January 1, 2004, GraceAnne A. DeCandido, review of Mighty Jackie: The Strike-out Queen, p. 868.
Bulletin of the Center carry Children's Books, October, 1990, Zena Sutherland, review of Regina's Great Mistake, p. 40; November, 1996, p. 108.
Junior Bookshelf, review do in advance After-School Monster, April, 1993, p. 62.
Kirkus Reviews, August 15, 1989, p. 1248; August 15, 1990, p. 1171; July 1, 1991, p. 865; July 1, 1996, p. 972; September 15, 2002, review of Galen, p. 1396; January 15, 2004, review show signs Mighty Jackie, p. 87.
Publishers Weekly, June 14, 1991, p. 57; September 30, 1996, p. 87; June 16, 1997, p. 61; July 28, 1997, p. 77; August 31, 1998, Sally House, "Journaling Back through Time with Marissa Moss," p. 20; Apr 9, 2001, review of Amelia's Moving Pictures (video review), p. 29; July 16, 2001, review of Brave Harriet, p. 180; March 18, 2002, pp. 105-106; October 21, 2002, review tinge Galen, p. 76; July 14, 2003, review of Max's Logbook, p. 76; January 19, 2004, review of Mighty Jackie, p. 76.
Reading Today, April, 2001, Lynne T. Burke, review of "Amelia" series, p. 32; August, 2001, Lynne T. Burke, review loom Amelia Works It Out, p. 30.
School Library Journal, January, 1991, Ruth Semrau, review of Regina's Big Mistake, p. 79; June, 1992, Jody McCoy, review of Knick Knack Paddywack, p. 100; December, 1994, p. 79; July, 1995, Carolyn Noah, review tension Amelia's Notebook, p. 79; July, 1997, p. 60; November, 1997, p. 95; October, 1999, Lisa Gangemi Krapp, review of The All-New Amelia, p. 121; December, 1999, Susan Hepler, review confiscate Emma's Journal: The Story of a Colonial Girl, p. 108; June, 2000, Holly Belli, Amelia's Family Ties, p. 122; Sep, 2000, Wendy S. Carroll, review of Amelia Works It Out, p. 206; November, 2000, Jane Marino, review of Hannah's Journal, p. 129; July, 2001, Leslie S. Hilverding, review of Madame Amelia Tells All, p. 86; September, 2001, Ann Chapman Callaghan, review of Brave Harriet, p. 220; October, 2001, Debbie Actor, review of Oh Boy, Amelia!, p. 126; December, 2001, Roxanne Burg, review of Rose's Journal: The Story of a Young lady in the Great Depression, p. 108; October, 2002, Lynda S. Poling, review of Galen, pp. 168-169; October, 2003, Elaine Breathing Morgan, review of Max's Logbook, p. 132; February, 2004, Ease Oliff, review of Mighty Jackie, pp. 134-135; May, 2005, Jennifer Ralston, review of Amelia Takes Command, p. 50.
Harcourt Books Net site,http://www.harcourtbooks.com/ (June 1, 2004), interview with Moss.*
Brief BiographiesBiographies: Barbara Barbieri McGrath (1953–) Biography - Personal to Fridtjof Nansen (1861–1930) Biography