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Ann Rinaldi Author Ann Rinaldi was born in New York City in 1934 to Michael and Marcella Feis. Ann's mother died while she was an infant, so Ann went to live with her aunt and uncle in Brooklyn. She recalls the time spent in their home with her doting teenage cousins as "the only happy part of my childhood." But it was short lived. For, as Ann explains, her father "abruptly" came and took her to live in New Jersey with him, her four siblings and a stepmother. Though Ann's father was a newspaper manager, she states he "did everything he could to prevent me from becoming a writer." Her father would not allow Ann to attend college, and her previous school years were discouraging. She says, "at school they attempted to take out of me what spirit had eluded my stepmother." So, as Ann explains, following graduation from high school, she went into the business world and became a secretary. In 1960, Ann married Ron Rinaldi. She explains, "Ron was middle-class and sane. I wanted sanity after my crazy upbringing." After marrying, Ann left the business world and, after having two children, decided she wanted to be a novelist. Ann wrote four novels; but quickly determined they were "terrible." But, in 1969, she asked for and was given a weekly column in the Somerset Messenger Gazette. She exults, "I earned seven dollars a week, but I was writing!" Then, in 1970, Ann was hired to write two columns a week for the Trentonian daily. She explains, "Within a couple of years I was writing features and soft news as well as columns, and learning the newspaper business." In 1979, Ann finally finished a short story she had been laboring over for years. That short story, entitled Term Paper became her first published novel. Ann explains that she did not write her story for young adults and that only after finishing it did she realize that what she had written could be marketed as a young adult novel. Term Paper was bought by the first publisher who read it and was soon followed by its sequel, Promises Are for Keeping. The rest is history. Ann was drawn into the study of American history when her son, Ron, became involved in Revolutionary War reenactments while he was in high school. In October 1981, when covering the reenactment of the day Trenton learned of the Yorktown victory, "I realized I was going to write a young adult novel on the American Revolution. A good one..." That realization quickly became reality. Within a year's time the research for and the writing of Time Enough for Drums was completed. A year after Time Enough for Drums was published, Ann declared, "Time Enough for Drums is close to my heart, my favorite -- the one everyone told me not to write! I went against the grain of what everybody told me, but then, that's what I did in my lifetime, too." Maybe that is why young adults find her work so easy to identify with. Ann went on to publish 32 novels, researching and traveling extensively. Ann expects two new novels to be published this spring. When she's not busy writing, Ann loves to read. She enjoys receiving e-mail from readers, and on a recent book tour to Cape Cod, a young woman working in a bookstore confided that's Ann's novels are what inspired her to choose American history as her college major. Ann lives in Branchburg with her husband, Ron. They have a son and a daughter and seven grandchildren. |
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