As the author of nearly forty books in multiple genres, Beth Kephart has been named a National Book Award finalist as well as a winner of the Pew Fellowships in the Arts grant, a National Endowment for the Arts grant, a Leeway grant for Creative Nonfiction, a Pennsylvania Council on the Arts Top Fiction grant, and the Speakeasy Poetry Prize, among other honors. Her books have received multiple starred reviews, been named to Best of Year lists, and been translated into more than fifteen languages.


TO COME

The Many Lives of…

Harold Underdown at Kane Press has acquired world rights to my The Many Lives of …, a four-book picture book series about the origins and uses of basic materials. The first book, The Many Lives of Paper, will be illustrated by Julia Breckenreid. Publication is scheduled for fall 2025.

Mud Angel, with Roberto Innocenti illustrating, Creative Editions, slated for 2026

The Land of Faraway, a very modern story inspired by an old fairytale, with illustrator Olga Dugina, for Tom Peterson at Creative Editions, Spring 2025.

Tomorrow Will Bring Sunday’s News: A Novel, Tursulowe Press, April 1, 2025

Cleopatra: The Goddess Queen, Core Books, slated for 2024

Dolores Huerta: Where Dreams Begin, Core Books, slated for 2024

AVAILABLE

You Are Not Vanished Here: Essays, Juncture Workshops, now available.

My Life in Paper: Adventures in Ephemera, Temple University Press, November 3, 2023

“Paper, the medium that has served as a canvas for human emotion, communication and history, is at the center of this searching memoir grappling with life, memory and legacy.” — New York Times Book Review, November 5, 2023

My conversation with Helen Hiebert, paper artist and teacher, April 21, 2024.

Week of April 15, 2024, featured in Where Women Create, The Pennsylvania Gazette, and North American Handpapermakers Society Newsletter. 

“A Paper Tale,” Omnia feature on My Life in Paper, March 26, 2024

“…a heartbreaking and highly original memoir,”Washington Independent Review of Books,February 1, 2024

“Beth Kephart Pens a Love Letter to Paper Through Her New Memoir,” PRINT Magazine, February 1, 2024

“I Took Instructions from My Hands,” Cleaver Magazine, January 17, 2024

Featured in What Women Create, a six-page spread on grass paper, Winter 2023/2024 issue

My Life in Paper featured on Helen Hiebert’s 100 Papery Picks 2023

My conversation with Michelle Fost, of Cleaver, about My Life in Paper, December 18, 2023

Blank Pages, Bound Books, in Writers Digest, December 22, 2023

Featured in Books by Women, “The Lessness of Things,” December 2023

The Free Library of Philadelphia launch of My Life in Paper, as a podcast.

“The Papermaker War,” in Orion, October 26, 2023.

My conversation with Caroline Leavitt, on A Mighty Blaze, November 9, 2023

A dialogue with Jehanne Dubrow, in Adroit Journal, December 12, 2023

“The beauty of her carefully crafted sentences is striking, but this is not about the solitary practice of writing. Instead, she muses over how reading and writing are interactive experiences and how that interconnectedness offers layers of meaning to paper objects, from old family photographs to recipes, diplomas, tickets, menus, and ledgers. Kephart invites reflection and engagement in her celebration of the many dimensions of the paper world and how reading and writing form an intersection for sharing the parts that make up the sum of each of us.” — Booklist

— Shoba Viswanathan

“As she offers insight into the fascinating world of papermaking, Kephart also reveals the intimate connection between memory and its most ubiquitous—and also most fragile—receptacle.” — Kirkus Reviews

“Beth Kephart’s memoir-in-essays contemplates paper in its many forms, including its emotional, historical, and tangible impacts. With cohesive eloquence, the book details how paper defines mundane aspects of everyday life…. Evocative and informative…. My Life in Paper reveals both personal and universal papery magic.”—Foreword Reviews

“On the Observational Lens,” Literary Hub, The Craft of Writing, November 29, 2023

Women of Letters interview, here.

“The Berwyn Farmers Market,” in Savvy Mainline, November 15, 2023

My interview about My Life in Paper, with Foreword Reviews, is here.

The story of the cover, here, at SPINE.

“Adventures in Ephemera,” an excerpt from My Life in Paper, in Image Journal, September 26

“Rare Books,” an excerpt in Literary Hub, November 16, 2023

“Diploma,” an excerpt in The Pennsylvania Gazette, November 15

“Syllabus,” in Los Angeles Review, October 9, 2023 (an excerpt from My Life in Paper)

“On Reading Fast and Reading Slow,” in Assay, October 1, 2023

“The Secret Language of End Papers,” in Fine Books Magazine, September 2023

Good Books for Bad Children: The Genius of Ursula Nordstrom, with Chloe Bristol, illustrating, Anne Schwartz Books, Random House, September 19, 2023

Good Books appears on the Cooperative Children’s Book Center 2024 Best of Year List, “a narrative with artful flair.”

My conversation with Leonard Marcus and Barbara McClintock, for the School Library Journal Breakfast Keynote, July 27, 2023

A Junior Library Guild selection

“A lively look at a dynamic personality credited with transforming children’s literature.” Publishers Weekly.

August 16: The Horn Book, Make way for…book-makers: “an excellent encapsulation of a seminal figure in children’s books.”

September 14: Publishers Weekly, New Kids’ and YA Books: Week of September 18, 2023

September 18: Satisfaction for Insatiable Readers, review

September 19: Mombian, review

Washington Post, September 22:“[GOOD BOOKS FOR BAD CHILDREN] presents a brisk version of the editor’s unusual upbringing and then focuses on her interactions with writers in a way that children can understand.”

This is an overdue picture-book biography of a woman who was one of the driving forces in creating children’s literature as we know it today. (She also edited Syd Hoff, Shel Silverstein, Toni Ungerer, Laura Ingalls Wilder, and Garth Williams, among others.) Young readers should enjoy learning about the story behind many of the other stories they know and love, and may even be inspired to become authors or editors themselves. The book also quietly gives them a rare model of a queer woman who not only has an impactful career, but also grows old with her beloved.

September 19: Mombian, 5 New Books for LGBTQ Families

 

Consequential Truths: On Writing the Lived Life, Juncture Workshops, June 2023

A Weave, a Basket, a Vessel: Outtakes from a Memoir Master Class,  Juncture Workshops, January 2023

A Room of Your Own: A Story Inspired by Virginia Woolf’s Famous Essay, with illustrator Julia Breckenreid, Cameron Kids/Abrams Books, August 2022

New York Times Book Review here.

Watch the trailer here.

A remarkable review, here.

A Must Reads review, here.

A generous end of year best books listing, here.

The Books of Wonder launch here (recorded via Crowdcast.)

A Room of Your Own: A Story Inspired by Virginia Woolf’s Famous Essay, my picture book with illustrator Julia Breckenreid, will launch on August 9. Publishers Weekly has called it a “dreamy book,” noting: “Together, images and text combine for an unequivocal ode to the necessity of being oneself, and of having time alone.” (Full review). Watch this brief video for insights into Woolf’s writing rooms and publishing world—combining rare images with some of Julia’s fabulous illustrations.

“Where do you go/ to think,/ to dream,/ to be?” Taking Virginia Woolf’s A Room of One’s Own as a jumping-off point, Kephart employs rhythmic lines to prompt readers’ own reflections on the possibility of personal space. With the support of Breckenreid’s lightly surrealistic pictures—which draw on motifs of blooms, books, and butterflies—room is interpreted expansively as “the shade beneath a tree,” “the cool/ beside the tail of the cat,/ behind the tablecloth,/ where nobody has found you yet,” and “the cone of light/ inside a bedsheet fort.” While depictions of Woolf open and close the dreamy book, and cameos of her appear throughout, most scenes present children of varying skin tones enjoying time to themselves in different types of homes. Together, images and text combine for an unequivocal ode to the necessity of being oneself, and of having time alone. An author’s note concludes. Ages 4–8. (Aug.) (Publishers Weekly)


Beautiful Useful Things,
with Melodie Stacie illustrating, Cameron Books/Abrams, Spring 2022

Kirkus Reviews: “Kephart’s text is leisurely, encouraging readers to fully take in every stanza and lovely illustration. Rich vocabulary, lyricism, and careful word choices enhance and deepen meaning. Stacey’s incredible soft-edged illustrations are reminiscent of Morris’ style: full of movement, imagination, and detail.”

Booklist: “A lovely book introducing a notable Englishman whose life and work are unfamiliar to most American children.”

My William Morris conversation with five other wonderful picture book writers, thanks to Books of Wonder.

Publishers Weekly on Beautiful Useful Things: “a volume about considering beauty that is, itself, restful.”

 

We Are the Words: The Master Memoir Class, Juncture, July 2021.

This beautiful review of We Are the Words: The Master Memoir Class, by Marcia Meier in Brevity Blog, January 5, 2022.

We Are the Words: The Master Memoir Class, Juncture, now available. “This is—hands down—the best book on writing memoir I’ve ever read.” — Judy Goldman, Together: A Memoir of a Marriage and a Medical Mishap

And I Paint It: Henriette Wyeth’s World, Cameron Books (Abrams), May 20, 2021

This wonderful review of And I Paint It in the San Francisco Chronicle.

“Kephart and Bates have created a deeply immersive book that allows readers to subtly experience the act of creating. Or, to be more precise, the act of seeing.” — Books4YourKids

A conversation about Henriette Wyeth, with Amy June Bates, at the Brandywine River Museum of Art, can be found here.

The beautiful BookPage review is here.

Publishers Weekly: “Kephart’s evocative text pairs dreamily with Bates’s illustrations of fully realized, painterly images of Henriette and her father at work, collected artist notebook–style alongside small, finely rendered pencil sketches of items such as a scratching hen and a blackberry vine.”

Kirkus: Evocative description intertwines with joyful illustration in an imagined day in the life of a young artist. (Picture book. 5-9)

Wife | Daughter | Self: a memoir in essays, Forest Avenue Press, March 2, 2021

Named one of the 35 of the Best Book Club Books by Independent Review, September 2023

“The second book is Beth Kephart’s Wife|Daughter|Self: A Memoir in Essays. What a poetic, soaring collection of connected essays that explores through memoir how we define ourselves in relation to who we love and our callings; the disorientation and grief of losing a disoriented parent; how hurtful words, overheard, can shape us; how even our deepest connections—our loves—cradle rifts; what it is to be a writer, an artist. The anchor of this collection of essays accretes and ripples out to form a full and complex human story. Each essay is a gem. “The Apostrophe Wife,” what I think of as the anchor of the collection, delves into the life of Henriette Wyeth, another daughter, sister, wife—of more famous male painters, but who was her own self, a painter, a complex human. It’s an essay rich in place, in art, and finally in the ways our lives can parallel and diverge from each other’s. There’s deep love in this memoir.” — Lex Orgera, Tiny Fires

Wife | Daughter | Self: A Memoir in Essays appears on “88 Writers on the Books They Loved in 2022,” the Freeman list, Lit Hub, December 23, 2022. Selected by Debra Gwartney: “The other book that swept me away this year is Beth Kephart’s Wife/Daughter/Self, with her gentle exploration of those three states of being. Kephart’s images are often breathtaking—her gift.”

Wife | Daughter | Self is a finalist, Foreword INDIES, Autobiography & Memoir.

Wife | Daughter | Self is a finalist in the Big Other Nonfiction Prize (2021).

Wife | Daughter | Self: A Memoir in Essays (Forest Avenue Press) appears on this list of top Indie Press books of 2021. Thank you, Independent Book Review.

Booklist gives WDS a star! “From the serenity of a kayaking-on-the-lake moment to fragmenting struggles with self-criticism, Kephart deftly and succinctly captures entire expanses of human experience.” — Booklist, Starred Review

WDS a Buzzfeed “18 Amazing Small Press Books to Add to your Summer Reading List” selection:

In so many ways, women are often identified by their relationships with others, like the dutiful daughter or the loving wife. In this essay collection, Kephart goes deeper into what it means to be a caretaker or a partner while, despite the title, resisting those definitions. This is a book that helps us understand ourselves and what it means to love.

“The very structure of Beth Kephart’s new book, Wife | Daughter | Self: A Memoir in Essays, performs what it is to be a self, which is to be many at once; not so much a “bundle of impressions” as David Hume famously suggested, but a nexus of relationships. The “I” is a busy intersection of debts and obligations and longings. And so Kephart dwells on some of these different facets in three different parts: wife, daughter, self. Each section is then something of a mosaic, with essays that zig and zag, but gently, like a leaf carried on a creek in summer. Kephart’s prose is so lyrically poetic it almost begs to be sung. As much as you’ll be drawn into an intimacy with the author—and, if you’re like me, fall in love with their marriage—this book leaves room for the reader to step back in contemplation and dwell for a while with the perennial question: Who am I?” — Jamie K.A. Smith, Image Journal

“Meet Beth Kephart, the Main Line’s finest writer – we’d say “arguably the finest” but we’d be lying – through the pages of her new memoir: Wife| Daughter| Self. It’s intimate, unconventional and altogether fascinating. You’ll learn about her marriage to a Salvadoran artist and why she never learned his native tongue; how ice skating, of all things, informs her writing; about her personal struggles with perfection and insomnia and so much more.” — Caroline O’Halloran, Savvy Main Line

The Hippocampus Review, by Angela Eckhart.

This beautiful review of Wife | Daughter | Self by Melissa Firman.

Posh Lifestyle and Beauty Blog Summer Reading List.

“Shattering the Frame: A Conversation with Beth Kephart,” The Adroit Journal, April 9, 2021.

My conversation with Jacinda Barrett at the Free Library of Philadelphia, about Wife | Daughter | Self.  Audio: https://libwww.freelibrary.org/podcast/episode/1982
Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CaiD81BNzv4

A conversation with Jackie Shannon Hollis about Wife | Daughter | Self at The Rumpus, March 3, 2021.

A gorgeous, profound meditation on making by Katrina Kenison, that ends with thoughts on WDS.

My conversation with Leslie Pietrzyk, at Work in Progress, about Wife | Daughter | Self, March 1, 2021

Foreword Reviews WDS here.

Washington Independent Review of Books reviews WDS here.

Carmel Breathnach on WDS.

Cleaver Magazine Interview with David Marchino

My podcast conversation about memoir and the writing life with Matty Dalrymple at The Indie Author, here, March 9, 2021.

“Kephart’s wife/daughter/self: a memoir in essays passes the whole of a life through the prism of intimate relations and the result is revelatory: a memoir that assembles itself as we read, until all its parts are shimmering with meaning and that most sought, most elusive treasure is revealed: what it means to be human, and aware.” Carolyn Forché, What You Have Heard is True

“Opening Beth Kephart’s memoir feels akin to stepping into a river of striking clarity and song. With tenacious honesty, Wife | Daughter | Self explores the weight and shape of the ever-deepening bonds we form with those closest to us and how those bonds intertwine with our perceptions of our innermost selves. This book is a journey into a life dedicated to writing and art, one that honors both joy and pain, love and loss. Piercing, lyrical, and wondrously alive with detail, Kephart’s sentences sing. I didn’t want it to end.” Chloe Honum, Then Winter

“A profound meditation on how our most cherished—and most complicated—relationships shape who we are. Kephart’s work is a masterclass in memoir.” Megan Stielstra, The Wrong Way to Save Your Life

“Rare and brave and beautifully written, wife/ daughter/ self is a memoir to savor. Beth Kephart is a jeweler: her words glisten, the emotions shine. This story of marriage, daughterhood, and motherhood, is also the story of an artist—how a woman becomes a writer and how she enters into conversation with the world. This moving work will linger with readers long after the final page.” Diana Abu-Jaber, The Language of Baklava

“She believes in acute, clear-eyed attention to the small moments. Her stories are bare, stripped down, whittled to their very essence, like one of her husband’s dark, pragmatic vessels. To her father, she says, ‘I am here. Are you there?’ In each line of prose she poses the question to us and we answer, yes, we are. We are here.”—Jacinda Barrett, actress and writer

Wife | Daughter | Self: A Memoir in Essays: “Beth Kephart has written a riveting, atmospheric dream of a book.  It’s a big, complicated portrait of a woman inhabiting the major roles of her life.  Sometimes we encounter Beth’s “tip-toe self,” artfully and gracefully telling her story.  Other times she’s out there — bold, making noise, “piercing the truth.”  But she never settles for the easy answer.  She’s really just asking bone-deep, tough questions.  Questions that turn everything back to her readers so that we can learn how to inhabit our own roles.  This memoir is so revelatory, so affecting, that long after you turn the last page, you won’t stop thinking about it.” Judy Goldman, Together: A Memoir of a Marriage and a Medical Mishap

Cloud Hopper, Penelope Editions, Penny Candy Books, September 2020

Cloud Hopper is a co-winner of the Paterson Prize for Books for Young People, 7 – 12 grades.

Junior Library Guild Selection

The Great Upending, Caitlyn Dlouhy, Atheneum Books for Young People, Simon & Schuster, March 31, 2020

2020 Bank Street Children’s Best Book of the Year Selection

Spring 2020 Gold Medal Parents Choice Award

Trini’s Big Leap, a picture book written with Alexander deWit, illustrated by William Sulit, Penny Candy Press, Fall 2019

Strike the Empty: Notes for Readers, Writers, and Teachers of Memoir, published by Juncture Workshops, January 2019

The Walls Between Us: essays in search of truth, edited by Beth Kephart, published by Juncture Workshops, October 2018

Wild Blues, Caitlyn Dlouhy, Atheneum Books for Young People, Simon & Schuster, June 2018

Tell the Truth. Make It Matter.: A Memoir Writing Workbook, Juncture Workshops, 2017

This Is the Story of You, Chronicle Books, April 2016

Love: A Philadelphia Affair, Temple University Press, October 2015

One Thing Stolen, Chronicle Books, Spring 2015 (more here)

Going Over, Chronicle Books, Spring 2014

Nest. Flight. Sky.: On love and loss, one wing at a time, January 31 2014, Shebooks

Nest. Flight. Sky. (Audibles recording)

Handling the Truth: On the Writing of Memoir, Gotham Books, August 6, 2013

Dr. Radway’s Sarsaparilla Resolvent, New City Community Press/Temple University Press, May 2013

Small Damages, Philomel Books, July 2012

You are My Only, Laura Geringer Books: Egmont USA, Fall 2011

Dangerous Neighbors, Laura Geringer Books: Egmont USA, August 2010

The Heart is not a Size, Balzer and Bray: HarperTeen, March 2010

Nothing but Ghosts, Laura Geringer Books: HarperTeen, June 2009

House of Dance, Laura Geringer Books: HarperTeen, June 2008

Zenobia: The Curious Book of Business, (with Matthew Emmens), Berrett-Koehler, January 2008

Undercover, Laura Geringer Books: HarperTeen, 2007

Flow: The Life and Times of Philadelphia’s Schuylkill River, Temple University Press, 2007

Ghosts in the Garden, New World Library, 2005

Seeing Past Z, W.W. Norton, 2004

Still Love in Strange Places: A Memoir, W.W. Norton, 2002

Into the Tangle of Friendship: A Memoir of the Things that Matter, Houghton Mifflin, 2000

A Slant of Sun: One Child’s Courage, W.W. Norton, 1998

Stories and essays appear in these selected anthologies:
Behind the Song, Sourcebooks, ed. K.M. Walton
use your words: a writing guide for mothers, Viva Editions, ed. Kate Hopper, 2012
No Such Thing as the Real World, HarperTeen, April 2010
Big Shoes: In Celebration of Dads and Fatherhood, Al Roker and Friends, Hyperion, 2005
Because I Said So, HarperCollins, 2005
Best American Sports Writing, Houghton Mifflin, 2003
New York Times Writers on Writing, Volume II, Times Books, 2003
The Kindness of Strangers, Lonely Planet, 2003
Best American Sports Writing, Houghton Mifflin, 2001
Wanderlust: Real-Life Tales of Adventure and Romance,Villard, 2000
Mothers Who Think, Villard, 1999
The Leap Years, Beacon Press, 1999

Awards and honors:
Wild Blues, PW Star
Wild Blues, Booklist Star
Wild Blues, Big Picture BCCB Review
Wild Blues, Junior Library Guild Selection
Wild Blues, given a five-star review from Youth Services Book Review
Wild Blues, Washington Parent selection
Wild Blues, rights sold in Spain and China
Wild Blues is a SLJ Summertime Read Selection
The Wild Blues|Breakout Conversation, Nerdy Book Club, July 20, 2018
This Is the Story of You, Top Ten VOYA
This Is the Story of You, NJ.Com Best of the Year List
This Is the Story of You, Junior Library Guild Selection
This Is the Story of You, Starred Review, School Library Journal
This Is the Story of You, Starred Review, Kirkus
This Is the Story of You, Starred Review, VOYA
One Thing Stolen, Parents Choice Gold Medal
One Thing Stolen, Starred Booklist Review
One Thing Stolen, Starred Shelf Awareness Review
One Thing Stolen, Amazon Editor’s Pick (April)
One Thing Stolen, Bustle Top 14 Pick (April)
One Thing Stolen, The Book Riot April-June Radar List
Going Over, Audio Rights sold to Audible
Going Over, 2014 Booklist Editors Choice
Going Over, 2015 TAYSHAS Reading List
Going Over, 2014 American Booksellers Association Best Books for Children and Teens
Going Over, 100 Children’s Books to Read, in a Lifetime/Readers’ Choice
Going Over, Gold Medal, Parents’ Choice Award, Historical Fiction
Going Over, a Scholastic Book Club books
Going Over, YALSA Best Fiction for Young Adults List
Going Over, Starred Booklist Review
Going Over, Starred School Library Journal Review
Going Over, Starred Shelf Awareness review
Going Over, A Junior Library Guild Selection
Going Over, A School Library Journal Pick of the Day
Going Over, a Booklist Top Ten Historical Fiction for Youth
Going Over, a five-star Common Sense Media selection
Going Over, an Indigo Best Teen Books of 2014 So Far
Going Over, an iBooks Big Spring Book
Going Over, an Amazon Big Spring Book
Going Over, a Main Line Today Magazine Top Ten Beach Read 
Going Over, excerpted in the Philadelphia Inquirer, here.
Nest. Flight. Sky.: On love and loss, one wing at a time, The Main Line Today Magazine review
Nest. Flight. Sky., Audibles Selection
Nest. Flight. Sky., Whatever Doesn’t Kill You Anthology
Nest. Flight. Sky., Whatever Doesn’t Kill You, Silver Ippy Award
Philadelphia Literary Legacy Exhibition at Philadelphia International Airport (2013/2014)
Radnor High School Hall of Fame: inducted Fall of 2010
Pennsylvania Gazette:  Feature Story Subject, November/December 2010
Beth Kephart Books blog named a 2009 and 2011 Top Author Blog by BBAW
Handling the Truth, Winner Motivational Category, Books for a Better Life  
Handling the Truth, Top Writing Book, Poets & Writers
Handling the Truth, Named to the North Shore Year-End List
Handling the Truth, Named Top Ten September 2013 Book, BookPage
Handling the Truth, Starred Library Journal Review
Handling the Truth, Starred Kirkus Review 
Handling the Truth, Featured in O Magazine, July 2013
Dr. Radway’s Sarsaparilla Resolvent, Named to Kirkus Best Children’s Books of 2013 List
Dr. Radway’s Sarsaparilla Resolvent, Starred Kirkus Review
Dr. Radway’s Sarsparilla Resolvent, Philly.com review
Dr. Radway’s Sarsaparilla Resolvent, Philadelphia Inquirer Review
Small Damages, 2013 Carolyn W. Field Honor Book, Pennsylvania Library Association
Small Damages, Outstanding Merit, Today category, Bankstreet Best Children’s Books of the Year
Small Damages, Best YA Novel of the Year, Armchair BEA
Small Damages, Nominated for YALSA’s 2013 Best Fiction for Young Adults
Small Damages, Named to Armchair BEA Best YA of the Year List (top three)
Small Damages, Most Lyrical YA Novel of the Year (Atlantic Wire)
Small Damages, Best Contemporary YA Novel of the Year (Bookalicious)
Small Damages, One of 25 Most Wonderful Book Covers of the Year (Atlantic Wire)
Small Damages, One of Best YA Novels of the Year (Sarah Laurence)
Small Damages, French rights sold (La Martiniere Group)
Small Damages, New York Times Book Review, July 13, 2012
Small Damages, Kirkus
Teen Pick of the Week, July 18, 2012
Small Damages, Publishers Weekly,
Best New Books for Week of July 16, 2012
Small Damages, BookPage Feature
Small Damages, BookPage, Handful of Books that Adults Need to Read
Small Damages, Shelf Awareness, Starred Review
Small Damages,
Family Circle Featured Selection, August 2012
Small Damages, Hot Beach Read, Bella Magazine
Small Damages, LA Times, Summer Read Selection
Small Damages, Kirkus Reviews, Starred Review
Small Damages,
Publishers Weekly, Starred Review
Small Damages, Dear Reader Teen Book Club Pick, September 3, 2012
Small Damages, Publishing Perspectives Interview
Small Damages, Dutch rights sold to Callenbach
You Are My Only, German rights sold to dtv-Reihe Hanser
You Are My Only, Brazilian-Portuguese Rights sold to Novo Conceito
You Are My Only, Family Circle Teen Week Read Pick
You Are My Only, Main Line Today Citation
You Are My Only/2011 A Top YA Novel, Most Beautifully Written Novel, There’s a Book
You Are My Only/2011 Short List for Best Fiction/Caribousmom
You Are My Only/2011 Buzz Books Which Did Not Disappoint/Caribousmom
You Are My Only/Dear Author Best of 2011
You Are My Only/2011 Favorite Reads/My Friend Amy
You Are My Only/Top Book of 2011, Two Heads Together
You Are My Only, Top Books of 2011, 3R’s Blog
You Are My Only, Dear Author Best of 2011/Best of October
Dangerous Neighbors, Scholastic Reading Counts list
Dangerous Neighbors, 2010 Autumn Indiebound Children’s Pick
Dangerous Neighbors, Publishers Weekly Starred Review
Dangerous Neighbors, 2010 Autumn Booklist Hot Teen Title
Dangerous Neighbors, landing-page Girls’ Life review
Dangerous Neighbors in PW’s “Bookexpo America 2010: “Big Children’s Books of the Show”
Dangerous Neighbors, nominated for DABWAHA
The Heart is Not a Size: Starred VOYA review
The Heart is Not a Size: Spring 2010 Children’s Indie List
The Heart is Not a Size: 2011 Nominee for Best Fiction for Young Adults/YALSA
The Heart is Not a Size: German Rights sold to Hanser
The Heart is Not a Size: Featured Story, El Paso Times
The Heart is Not a Size: Featured Story, Presbyterian News Wire
Nothing but Ghosts: Summer 2012 German translation (DTV), Lead Summer Title
Nothing but Ghosts: Starred Publishers Weekly
Nothing but Ghosts: Starred BCCB
Nothing but Ghosts: Family Circle Must Read
Nothing but Ghosts: Boston Globe Feature
House of Dance: A Best Book of the Year, Kirkus (2008) and Bank Street (2008)
House of Dance: Nominated for Georgia Children’s Book Award
House of Dance: 2010-2011 Tayshas High School Reading List
House of Dance: Family Circle Must Read
Undercover: A Best Book of the Year, School Library Journal (2007), Kirkus (2007), and Amazon.com (2007), and Bank Street College of Education’s Best Children’s Books of the Year
Undercover: Family Circle Must Read
Undercover: New York Public Library Book for the Teen Age
Undercover: Translated into Dutch, Callenbach Publishing House
Undercover: Audio Recorded Books
Undercover:  Translated into Simplified Chinese, Shanghai 99 Readers’ Cultare Co.
Undercover: Translated into Complex Chinese, Shing Shing Publishing
Undercover: Texas Library Association pick
Undercover: Tayshas High School Reading List
Undercover:  Starred reviews from Publishers Weekly, Kirkus, School Library Journal, and Booklist
Zenobia: now translated into Portuguese (Brazil), Portuguese (Portugal), Chinese Complex, Chinese Simplified, Dutch, Arabic, Korean, Spanish, Italian, and English Reprint in India
Flow: Pew Fellowships in the Arts (2005) recipient
Speakeasy Poetry Prize (2005)
Ghosts in the Garden: March 2005 BookSense Pick
Into the Tangle of Friendship: National Endowment for the Arts Grant (2000)
Into the Tangle of Friendship: Leeway Grant for Creative Nonfiction (1998)
A Slant of Sun: Salon Best Book of the Year (1998) (among other best of lists)
A Slant of Sun: National Book Award, Nonfiction Finalist (1998)
Short Stories: Pennsylvania Council on the Arts Top Fiction Grant (1997)
Short Stories: Bread Loaf Merit Scholar for Fiction (1996)