Cynthia Kadohata

Cynthia Kadohata is a highly acclaimed American author, best known for her young adult and children's novels. She is of Japanese descent and has made a name for herself by writing coming-of-age stories that feature Asian American women. Kadohata spent a significant portion of her childhood in the South, which has influenced some of her novel's settings.

Kadohata's journey as a writer began in 1982 when she was 25 years old and feeling somewhat lost in life. She embarked on a Greyhound bus trip to the West Coast, eventually traveling through the Southwest and the South. It was during this trip that she rediscovered a talent she had overlooked since her youth - fiction writing. Although she had never considered pursuing fiction before, Kadohata began working on it in the year that followed. Her hard work paid off in 2013 when she won the National Book Awards for her novel, "The Thing About Luck."

Born and raised in Chicago, Kadohata's first short story was published in 1986 in The New Yorker. She earned her B.A. in journalism from the University of Southern California and attended graduate programs at the University of Pittsburgh and Columbia University. Kadohata has written ten children's books, including "Kira-Kira," which won the 2005 Newbery Medal, and "The Thing About Luck," which won the National Book Award. Her first adult novel, which is a New York Times Notable Book of the Year, and her first children's novel, both take place in Southern states. Kadohata currently resides in Los Angeles, California, with her boyfriend, son, and dogs.

In addition to her professional accomplishments, Kadohata is also an animal lover and has had six rescue dogs as her best friends. She has been fortunate to have mostly worked as a writer during her adult life and has written several award-winning children's books. Her upcoming book, "Saucy," is about a piglet that is like millions of others, yet also uniquely herself.