Dead End in Norvelt

While in college, he and an illustrator friend, Nicole Ruben, began working on picture books.  After a series of well-deserved rejections they published their first book, Rotten Ralph, in 1976.

Jack continued to write children’s books and began to teach courses in children’s book writing and children’s literature.  He developed the master’s degree programme in children’s book writing at Emerson College, and later began the Master’s of Fine Arts Degree in Children’s Writing at Vermont College – the most successful course of its kind in the US.  He in well-known in America for his educational creative writing and literature presentations to students and teachers and is a frequent conference speaker.

Jack is the author of the Rotten Ralph books, which have been televised by the BBC.  His novels Joey Pigza Swallowed The Key and Joey Pigza Loses Control are published by Corgi.

Jack’s latest book, Hole in My Life, is a young adult book.  It’s a memoir about his time in prison.  At 18 years old Jack was looking for a way to fund himself through university, when he was offered $10,000 to sail a boatload of drugs to New York he jumped at it.  It resulted in a year in a federal prison with a lot of time to think.  The book looks at second chances and determination to get what we want out of life.