Alison McGhee (born July 8, 1960) is an American author, who has published several picture books, books for children, and adult novels. She is a New York Times bestselling author, and the winner of numerous awards.

Education

McGhee attended Holland Patent High School, in New York and Middlebury College in Vermont.

Career

McGhee's first novel, Rainlight, follows the characters left behind after the sudden and accidental death of Starr Williams. It received positive reviews and won both the Great Lakes College Association National Fiction Award and the Minnesota Book Award in 1999. McGhee's sophomore effort, Shadow Baby, is witnessed through the eyes of a young girl who befriends an old man as part of a school project. It was a Pulitzer Prize nominee. McGhee continued her adult themes with Was It Beautiful?. She then began writing children's pictures. Countdown to Kindergarten and Mrs. Watson Wants Your Teeth, both share the same main character who begins the first story as she enters kindergarten and is in first grade by the second book. Turning her hand to young adult novels, McGhee introduced Snap and All Rivers Flow to the Sea. In Only a Witch Can Fly McGhee focuses on poetry. In this story-poem, created in sestina form, a little girl dreams about flying on her broom. McGhee is also a professor of creative writing at Metropolitan State University in Saint Paul, Minnesota.

Personal life

McGhee is single with three grown children.

Novels for adults

Young adult and middle-grade novels

Picture books

Awards