Kristiana Gregory has published more than 30 children's book with Scholastic, Harcourt and Holiday House, and has now ventured into self-publishing with her memoir BLUE SKIES: ONE AUTHOR'S JOURNEY, due Spring 2015.
She grew up in Manhattan Beach, California, two blocks from the beach and she always loved to make up stories, telling her younger siblings whoppers that would leave them wide-eyed. Her first rejection letter at age eleven was for a poem she wrote in class when she was supposed to be doing a math assignment. She's had a myriad of odd jobs: telephone operator, lifeguard, camp counselor, reporter, book reviewer & columnist for the LA Times.
Kristiana's award-winning novels include JENNY OF THE TETONS, which earned the SCBWI Golden Kite Award. Set in 1876, it tells the story of the Shoshone Indian and her fur-trapper husband, Beaver Dick Leigh. Jenny Lake and Leigh Lake in Wyoming are named after this couple.
STALKED won the 2012 Gold Medal for Young Adult Mystery from Literary Classics and is hailed as "historical fiction with a thrilling twist." KIRKUS says it "will thrill YA readers ... with insightful details about the immigration process and New York tenements in the early 1900s."
Her most recent title with Scholastic's Dear America series is CANNONS AT DAWN, a sequel to the best-selling THE WINTER OF RED SNOW, which was made into a movie for the HBO Family Channel. Her Royal Diary, CLEOPATRA VII: DAUGHTER OF THE NILE, was also an HBO movie. Several of her titles are now available on Kindle including "Curiously Odd Stories: Vol. 1 & Vol. 2" with the celebrated 'Paper Monument', a futuristic book-banning with horrific consequences.
New re-releases in e-books & paperback on Amazon:
JIMMY SPOON AND THE PONY EXPRESS
PRAIRIE RIVER SERIES
ORPHAN RUNAWAYS: THE PERILOUS ESCAPE TO BODIE
CABIN CREEK MYSTERIES
BRONTE'S BOOK CLUB. Set in a town by the sea, five girls read Scott O'Dell's ISLAND OF THE BLUE DOLPHINS, finding parallels in their lives and that of the main character, Karana, the Chumash Indian who lived alone on San Nicholas Island during the 1800s.
THE WAITING LIGHT: CLEMENTINE'S STORY. This riveting historical mystery set in an Idaho mining camp of 1866, was Idaho's choice for the 2010 National Book Festival in Washington, D.C., sponsored by the Library of Congress.
Kristiana and her husband have two adult sons, and live in Idaho with their two golden retrievers. In her spare time she loves to swim, hike, read & hang out with friends.
