Heidi Stemple, Children's Author

Send us a text

In this episode, I chat with Heidi Stemple about her writing practice, the rules and skills needed to write children's books, having  a celebrity writing mother (Jane Yolen), and keeping the writing business in the family!

Heidi Stemple didn’t want to be a writer when she grew up. In fact, after she graduated from college, she became a probation officer in Florida. It wasn’t until she was 28 years old that she gave in and joined the family business, publishing her first short story in a book called Famous Writers and Their Kids Write Spooky Stories. The famous writer was her mom, author Jane Yolen. Since then, she has published more than thirty-five books and numerous short stories and poems, mostly for children.

 Heidi lives and writes on a big old farm in Massachusetts that she shares with one very large cat who lives inside, and a dozen deer, a family of bears, three coyotes, two bobcats, a gray fox, tons of birds, and some very fat groundhogs who live outside. Once a year she calls owls for the Audubon Christmas Bird Count.

Heidi Stemple

Books by Heidi Stemple

Owl Moon, Jane Yolen

The Tower of Life: How Yaffa Eliach Rebuilt Her Town in Stories and Photograph, Chana Stiefel (author), Susan Gal (illustrator)

Too Early, Nora Ericson

The Life And Crimes Of Hoodie Rosen, Isaac Blum

A Time to Dance, Padma Venkatraman

Flamer, Mike Curato

All Boys Aren’t Blue: A Memoir-Manifesto, George M. Johnson

The Kidlit World

Support the show

The Bookshop Podcast
Mandy Jackson-Beverly
Social Media Links