Audrey Penn


Audrey Penn is an American children's writer. She is best known for writing The Kissing Hand, a picture book featuring anthropomorphic raccoons.

Biography

Audrey Penn grew up in Silver Spring, Maryland. Audrey Penn didn’t start off her career as a writer. Penn, in the 1970s, was a ballerina dancer dancing for the New York City Ballet, Danny Diamond Dance Theatre, Stuttgart Ballet, and the National Ballet. Between 1973 and 1976 she was a choreographer for the US Figure Skating team for the Pan American Games and the 1976 Olympic Gymnastics Team. Penn's first book was Happy Apple Told Me. In 1980, after developing Juvenile Rheumatoid Arthritis, Penn was too ill to continue with ballet. Due to many painful surgeries and not being able to walk for weeks led her to write more books like Blue Out of Season and No Bones About Driftiss. Penn currently resides in Maryland with her husband and their three children.

Awards

Audrey Penn's first book written in 1975, Happy Apple Told Me, won the Midstate Library Association Award and was nominated for the Caldecott Medal Award. Penn's second book, Blue Out of Season, won the Mid-State Library Association Award and Very Special Arts Recognition Award. Her best known book, The Kissing Hand, was a New York Times number one best seller and won the Distinguished Achievement Award for Excellence in Educational Journalism. In 2004, A Pocket Full of Kisses also was a New York Times number one best seller.

Books

  • Apple Told Me
  • Blue Out of Season
  • No Bones About Driftiss
  • The Kissing Hand
  • Sassafras
  • A.D.D. Not B.A.D.
  • Feathers and Fur
  • The Whistling Tree
  • A Pocket Full of Kisses
  • Mystery At Blackbeard's Cove
  • A Kiss Goodbye
  • Blackbeard And The Sandstone Pillar Part I: When Lightning Strikes
  • Blackbeard And The Sandstone Pillar Part 2:The Gift of Silence
  • Chester Raccoon and the Big Bad Bully
  • The Miracle Jar: a Hanukkah Story
  • Chester Raccoon and the Acorn Full of Memories
  • ''A Bedtime Kiss for Chester Raccoon''

    Upcoming books

  • Blackbeard's Legacy: Shared/Time
  • ''Chester the Brave''

    Teaching activity websites

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Category:American ballerinas
Category:American children's writers
Category:American choreographers
Category:Living people
Category:Writers from Maryland
Category:Writers from Silver Spring, Maryland
Category:Year of birth missing
Category:21st-century American women