ABOUT KELLY COON
I was born in Flint, Michigan, which is sadly infamous for its murder rates and water crisis and not coney island hot dogs, a Vehicle City delicacy everyone should really know about. I learned all about following rules as I grew up. (And breaking them.) In '97, I found myself staring at the angry eyebrows of a woman expelling me from a religious college because I, as a young woman, had stepped foot off campus without a chaperone. Thus began my foray into women’s rights and out of religious colleges. I learned, grew, and realized that writing fierce stories about women is kinda my thing.
With more than enough fodder for poetry and personal essays, I graduated summa cum laude with my BA in Creative Writing from the University of Michigan in 2000, the same year I married a man who is very handsome and also kind of a genius. In 2004, I earned my master's in Secondary English Education to teach teenagers the stories with which I'd been enamored since I was in pigtails. (Ahh, Romeo and Juliet!)
From there, I became a mom to three boys, a small business owner of some really cool vacation rentals, a business and parenting writer and editor, and started penning the books I’d always loved to read. Now, I'm a nonfiction author and young adult fiction author represented by Kari Sutherland with kt literary. My debut YA fantasy, GRAVEMAIDENS, was published with Delacorte/ Random House in 2019. WARMAIDENS, the sequel, was published in 2020.
Gravemaidens recounts the tale of two sisters: Kammani, a 16-year-old healer's apprentice who wants to save the dying ruler of her city-state and Nanaea, Kammani’s little sister who will be buried alive as the ruler’s bride if he dies. The problem? Nanaea wants the honor. My sons say it's spooky, but cool.
In the nonfiction arena, I was the executive editor for Blue Ocean Brain, and have researched, written, and edited thousands of articles in the education, parenting, and business sphere which have been published in print and digital format by ThoughtCo, Scholastic, Microsoft, The Washington Post, Scary Mommy, Folks, Parent Map, OverDrive, and in two nonfiction ACT test prep books, ACT Strategy Smart and Ace the ACT by the Research and Education Association.
Want to know more or want to book me for a school visit or workplace editing lunch and learn? Click my contact page. =)
Q&A
Which jobs have you had? Housekeeper; ice cream scooper; Don Pablo's and Outback server; Y2K researcher (back when we thought the world was going to explode at midnight on January 1st, 2000); luxury apartment salesperson extraordinaire; middle school substitute teacher (hoo boy); high school teacher; writer; editor
What's the first book that made you cry? Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson, who is still one of my favorite MG authors.
How long does it take you to write a book? Eleventy-million hours. Also, it depends on the type of book. I wrote ACT Strategy Smart in three months before edits, but it took me a full year to write Gravemaidens because of life and no deadlines. I’ve found, however, that on deadline I work faster. I wrote the first draft of the sequel to Gravemaidens in 42 days and the first draft of a sci-fi in 36 days.
What is the most difficult scene you've written? My main character witnesses a woman getting the teeth bashed out of her head with a brick in Gravemaidens. It took me a week to write that scene because I kept having to force myself to write the accompanying sounds. Blech.
Which writer do you admire the most? Wow. It's really difficult to name just one, but if forced by sword point and a gangplank, I’m going to have to say Toni Morrison. She’s an all-around amazing author. Pulitzer prize-winner. Nobel prize-winner. Fought racism and misogyny despite everything thrown against her. She’s tough in her delivery of human truths. Remarkably so. But she crafts beauty with just as much ferocity.
If you weren't a writer, what would you be? A surgeon!
Where do you live? In Florida outside of Tampa.
Have you ever Googled yourself? You haven't? You should. You never know what's out there.
What's your favorite book? Soooooo manyyyyyy and for a multitude of different reasons. A few I love:
Pulitzers: Beloved, by Toni Morrison, The Good Earth, by Pearl S. Buck, Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides, The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen, The Orphan Master's Son by Adam Johnson
YA Fiction: The Book Thief by Markus Zusak, Red Queen by Victoria Aveyard, Immoral Code by Lillian Clark, Never Saw You Coming, by Erin Hahn, Legend by Marie Lu, An Ember in the Ashes series by Sabaa Tahir, The Wrath and the Dawn by Renée Ahdieh, Simon Vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda by Becky Albertalli.
Got a favorite band? I love a wide range of music. Everything from Eminem to Jay Z to Hozier to Beyonce. I don't typically write to music, though. It’s usually white noise and white noise only, but I have written some very good poetry to rap. ;-).
Any favorite TV shows? Oh gosh, got a pen? The writing on The Good Wife is sneaky with the cliffhangers at the end of every show. I also kind of adore trash TV where people are instantly married at the altar the first time they meet. I'm also in love with The Handmaid's Tale and was a This is Us FANATIC before it ended.
Favorite movies? Ferris Bueller's Day Off. Titanic. Braveheart. The Shawshank Redemption. Gladiator. Good Will Hunting. Slumdog Millionaire.
Can you do any cool tricks? I can roll my tongue three times. And I know most of the lyrics to "Mama Said Knock You Out" by LL Cool J. That's pretty much it. Oh! I can speak a little German, which comes in handy almost never.
What's something most people don't know about you? I sing all of the time when I'm home alone. If I try it in front of my kids, they tell me to be quiet. Also, even though I'm a serious extrovert (where's the party????), an ideal two hours would involve me sitting on my couch with a coffee, a blanket, and the next amazing novel.
