About
Although born in Florida, Larry Dane Brimner spent his early childhood exploring Alaska's Kodiak Island. He traces his love of reading to that time in his life. Since there was no television reception and only sporadic radio reception, entertainment came in the form of books and stories. Reading and making up stories was a part of day-to-day family life. Raised in a traditional Southern family--his parents hail from Birmingham, Alabama--telling falsehoods was frowned upon but embellishment was encouraged. Larry experienced his first writing successes--mostly in the genre of poetry--while still an undergraduate in college, but he began to focus on writing for young people during his twenty-year teaching career and is now a full-time writer and author of more than 150 books for readers of all ages.
Larry made his debut in children's books with the publication of BMX Freestyle (Watts) in 1987. Readers responded by naming it an International Reading Association (IRA) Children's Choice book for 1988. Subsequent books also proved popular with their targeted audience, garnering nominations for several young reader awards. Max and Felix was a nominee for the Kentucky Bluegrass Award; Elliot Fry's Good-bye, a nominee for Maryland's Black-Eyed Susan Picture Book Award; and Merry Christmas, Old Armadillo, a nominee for Alabama's Children's Choice Award and named to the Kansas Reading Circle. Another sports title, Snowboarding, was named a Children's Choice book for 1998 by the IRA/CBC, while The Official M&M's Book of the Millennium was named a Children's Choice book for 2000. A project about a skateboard-riding, fish-taco-eating cat called Cat on Wheels was nominated for the 2002 Michigan Readers' Choice Award. The Littlest Wolf (HarperCollins, 2002), which was translated into Japanese, was named an IRA/CBC Children's Choice book. It also received the Oppenheim Gold Medal for Best Book 2002, won the San Diego Books Award (2002), was a 2004 Great Lakes' Great Books (Michigan) Honor Book, and was a 2005 nominee for the Arkansas Diamond Award. Subway: The Story of Tunnels, Tubes, and Tracks (Boyds Mills Press, 2004) was a Junior Library Guild selection and is a PBS TeacherSource recommended book for Science and Mechanical Technology. More recently, We Are One: The Story of Bayard Rustin (Calkins Creek, 2007) won the Norman A. Sugarman Biography Award and the Jane Addams Book Award. His Birmingham Sunday (Calkins Creek, 2010) received starred reviews from Kirkus and School Library Journal, and was an Orbis Pictus honor book (National Council of Teachers of English) and a Jane Addams Honor Book Award recipient.
Larry made his debut in children's books with the publication of BMX Freestyle (Watts) in 1987. Readers responded by naming it an International Reading Association (IRA) Children's Choice book for 1988. Subsequent books also proved popular with their targeted audience, garnering nominations for several young reader awards. Max and Felix was a nominee for the Kentucky Bluegrass Award; Elliot Fry's Good-bye, a nominee for Maryland's Black-Eyed Susan Picture Book Award; and Merry Christmas, Old Armadillo, a nominee for Alabama's Children's Choice Award and named to the Kansas Reading Circle. Another sports title, Snowboarding, was named a Children's Choice book for 1998 by the IRA/CBC, while The Official M&M's Book of the Millennium was named a Children's Choice book for 2000. A project about a skateboard-riding, fish-taco-eating cat called Cat on Wheels was nominated for the 2002 Michigan Readers' Choice Award. The Littlest Wolf (HarperCollins, 2002), which was translated into Japanese, was named an IRA/CBC Children's Choice book. It also received the Oppenheim Gold Medal for Best Book 2002, won the San Diego Books Award (2002), was a 2004 Great Lakes' Great Books (Michigan) Honor Book, and was a 2005 nominee for the Arkansas Diamond Award. Subway: The Story of Tunnels, Tubes, and Tracks (Boyds Mills Press, 2004) was a Junior Library Guild selection and is a PBS TeacherSource recommended book for Science and Mechanical Technology. More recently, We Are One: The Story of Bayard Rustin (Calkins Creek, 2007) won the Norman A. Sugarman Biography Award and the Jane Addams Book Award. His Birmingham Sunday (Calkins Creek, 2010) received starred reviews from Kirkus and School Library Journal, and was an Orbis Pictus honor book (National Council of Teachers of English) and a Jane Addams Honor Book Award recipient.
