Grubbies

About Mary

I grew up in a small Massachusetts town with ten brothers and sisters, and spent my early years running in the woods, catching snakes, playing games, putting on plays and circuses, fighting with my sibs, cleaning the houses my dad built, drawing horses, pretending to be a horse, stacking firewood, baking, swimming, playing soccer, catching fireflies, and to get out of doing the supper dishes, reading books to my younger brothers. My first book, "Snakes, Snakes and More Snakes," was never published, though I continued to write poems. After high school, I boarded my first plane to UC Berkeley where I studied poetry with Robert Hass, August Kleinzahler, Thom Gunn, Ishmael Reed and Robert Pinsky, and paid my way to an English degree with a minor in Creative Writing by working at a cafe. One of my early poems turned into my first novel, STAY. I went on to publish two more novels, SHIP SOONER and DEAR BLUE SKY (Middle Grade), and to ghostwrite for the "Beacon Street Girls" series. I am the recipient of the Chautauqua Literary and Scientific Circle Award, Massachusetts Cultural Council Grant, Rona Jaffe Foundation Award, and a St. Botolph's Award. HIGH, my first novel-in-verse, won the Eric Hoffer Award for YA Literature. I currently live in Cambridge, Massachusetts with my husband (we have four children)—where I still try to get out of doing the supper dishes, but no longer catch snakes. I teach at Harvard Summer School, Harvard Extension School, and Grub Street and am a freelance editor.