author

Photo copyright Heather Weston

I am the author of three Ruby Oliver books: The Boyfriend List, The Boy Book, and The Treasure Map of Boys — plus a fourth, Real Live Boyfriends, that comes out December 28, 2010. Other books: Fly on the Wall, Dramarama, The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks and How to Be Bad.

Disreputable History was a Printz Award honor book, a finalist for the National Book Award, and recipient of the Cybils Award for best young adult novel.

My books have been translated into 10 foreign languages. Or maybe more. I have a doctorate in English Literature from Columbia University and have taught composition, literature and creative writing courses at Columbia, Barnard and NYU. I have given guest lectures on writing for children at places which include Hamline University, VT College, and Kindling Words.

Twenty-one things you don’t know about me, even if you’ve read through this whole website:

I have wanted to be a writer since I was eight years old.
I wrote two novels in third grade.
I was the fastest typist in my 8th-grade typing class. We learned on manual typewriters.
Now I write everything on computer, sometimes with my eyes closed.
Favorite lipsticks: Bobbi Brown Cherry. Clinique Black Honey.
Movie star crush: Daniel Craig.
First car: a white 1964 Volvo with a push-button starter.
I make a lot of home movies. You can see the book-related ones here.
I am a vegetarian and for a number of years ate a vegan diet (no animal products whatsoever) because I object to the way animals are treated in the meat and dairy industries. I will probably go back to eating vegan again someday, but for now:
My favorite ice cream is Häagen Dazs dolce de leche.
I swam with sting-rays once.
I like wax museums.
I used to like roller coasters, but now I’m scared of them. Even so:
I love amusement parks. My favorite ride of all time is Pirates of the Caribbean.
I used to cry after my fiction writing class in college, because the criticism was so harsh.
The teacher of that class was so bored by my work he admitted to me he didn’t even read the final drafts of my stories.
I have never kept a journal for more than a couple days. I like to write for an audience, even if it’s only an imaginary one.
My advice to aspiring writers: read, read, read. Read the great novelists, especially. Try Great Expectations. Pride and Prejudice. Jane Eyre.
More (contradictory!) advice: follow your reading bliss. Gnaw your way through the local library’s sci-fi or romance collection, if that’s what does it for you.
I am difficult to recognize. Despite a large and unusual tattoo, people often forget they’ve met me, or tell me I look very different from the last time they saw me.
I used to not reveal my first name, just to be mysterious, but then I had to change my website URL. I couldn’t have e-lockhart or elockhart because they were taken or infected by spambots; emilylockhart was the best address available, so now everyone knows it.

(This list is an idea I got from a very cool interview with Libba Bray, author of A Great and Terrible Beauty and Going Bovine.)