HEARTBEAT by Sharon Creech List Price: $15.99 Pages: 192 Format: Hardcover ISBN: 0060540222 Publisher: Joanna Cotler, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers

Known for writing with a classic voice and unique style, Sharon Creech is the best-selling author of the Newbery Medal winner WALK TWO MOONS, and the Newbery Honor Book THE WANDERER. She is also the first American in history to be awarded the CILIP Carnegie Medal for RUBY HOLLER. Her other works include the novels LOVE THAT DOG, BLOOMABILITY, ABSOLUTELY NORMAL CHAOS, CHASING REDBIRD, and PLEASING THE GHOST, and two picture books: A FINE, FINE SCHOOL and FISHING IN THE AIR. These stories are often centered around life, love, and relationships -- especially family relationships. Ms. Creech's first novel for children, ABSOLUTELY NORMAL CHAOS, was based on her own "rowdy and noisy" family. Growing up in a big family in Cleveland, Ohio, helped Ms. Creech learn to tell stories that wouldn't be forgotten in all of the commotion: "I learned to exaggerate and embellish, because if you didn't, your story was drowned out by someone else's more exciting one."

With a knack for storytelling and love of reading, a young Ms. Creech aspired to become a novelist: "To be able to create other worlds, to be able to explore mystery and myth -- I couldn't imagine a better way to live. . .except perhaps to be a teacher, because teachers got to handle books all day long." In college, Ms. Creech took her first writing courses and attended writing workshops. This renewed her enthusiasm for becoming a novelist. Following her studies in college and graduate school, Ms. Creech worked as an editorial assistant before deciding to become a teacher overseas. Now, after spending eighteen years teaching and writing in Europe, she and her husband have returned to the United States to live.

© Copyright 2004 by Sharon Creech. Reprinted with permission by Joanna Cotler, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers. All rights reserved.

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