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Angela Shelf Medearis
BIOGRAPHY


Angela Shelf Medearis’ career as an author began the day she was fired from her job as a legal secretary. She decided to pursue her dream of writing so that she could be a stay-at-home mother. After four long years, hundreds of painful rejection letters, and numerous unpublished manuscripts, Angela decided to stop sending her work to New York publishers and submitted her manuscript PICKING PEAS FOR A PENNY to a small, regional publisher in her hometown, Austin, Texas.

Her husband, Michael, worked full-time and part-time to support her dreams and assisted her on her road trips to school districts around Texas to promote her book a time her refers to as Driving Ms. Angela. They sold more than 10,000 copies of PICKING PEAS FOR A PENNY at schools, autograph-signings, and book conferences. The appearances helped Angela hone her skills as a storyteller and she has been named one of the “Best Storyteller’s in the World” by Storytelling World Magazine.

Texas Monthly Magazine calls Angela Shelf Medearis “one of the most influential writers of children’s literature in Texas,” and rightly so. Mrs. Medearis is now the award-winning author of more than 90 books for children, including Seven Spools of Thread, Picking Peas for a Penny, Dancing With The Indians, Poppa’s New Pants, The Singing Man, Annie’s Gifts, Too Much Talk, The Ghost of Sifty-Sifty Sam, The Freedom Riddle, Skin Deep, Treemonisha, Tailypo, the Zebra Riding Cowboy, and Rum A Tum Tum. The What Did I Do To Deserve A Sister Like You? series is based upon her childhood. Her book, Chester’s CASA, was published by Scholastic, Inc. for distribution to children in the Court Appointed Special Advocates (CASA) program for children in foster care. She wrote the award-winning story, Daisy And The Doll, and several other books about African-American arts and Texas history with Michael Medearis.

Her books have sold more than 10 million copies worldwide, and are featured on a line of animated DVDs. The Storyteller Series: Many Books, Many Languages Bilingual DVDs are produced and narrated by Mrs. Medearis, as well ANGELA’S NOTEBOOK, an educational television show about writing, reading, authors and illustrators. Her works are found in schools, libraries and bookstores around the United States, and have been translated into Spanish, French, Dutch, and Japanese. She has worked as a reading consultant for the Scholastic, Inc. and McGraw-Hill Literacy Programs. She also assisted the companies with the development of their reading series for elementary school children. She has written several articles for Scholastic’s READ AND RISE and GO! HEALTHY KIDS magazines. Mrs. Medearis is also the author of four cookbooks The African-American Kitchen, The Kwanzaa Celebration, Ideas For Entertaining From The African-American Kitchen, and The Ethnic Vegetarian.

Angela Shelf Medearis BIOGRAPHY Angela Shelf Medearis’ career as an author began the day she was fired from her job as a legal secretary. She decided to pursue her dream of writing so that she could be a stay-at-home mother. After four long years, hundreds of painful rejection letters, and numerous unpublished manuscripts, Angela decided to stop sending her work to New York publishers and su... More