Jason Reynolds

Biographical Information
Jason Reynolds was born in Washington, D.C. on December 6, 1984 and grew up with his parents and three siblings in Maryland. His mother was a special education teacher at a public school in Maryland. Reynolds and his family grew up in a poor neighborhood during the 1980s, he said,"This was the 1980s, when every poor neighborhoodwas torn apart by drugs. This was a time when everyone was dealing it, or doing it... To Kill a Mockingbird wasn't about me. There was a funny gap from 1980-1999 where other than Walter Dean Myers's Scorpions, there were no books" [1 ] This was the point where Reynolds stopped having interested in books and really didn't read until he was 17 years old.

This didn't mean that he wasn't exposed to or didn't enjoy literacy growing up. He was inspired to begin writing by listening to Queen Latifah's album Black Reign -- this is when he started to write poetry at nine years old. Listeing to rap made him feel "significant" and "necessary," something that he didn't see in books. Reynolds continued to write poetry all the way to college, where he began his love for reading literature. This started with reading Richard Wright's Black Boy; from there he began to read many classics written by African-American authors. This was also the time where Reynolds discovered street/urban fiction.

Reynolds published his first book with Jason Griffin after moving to New York in 2009, but it ended up failing. He wanted to give up and was struggling to make ends meet, as he was living in his car at this point. He was motivated by the words of his friend Christopher Myers, who is Walter Dean Myers son, who told him to "put his natural tongue down" on paper and it took him far ways. This was when he wrote his Coretta Scott King/John Steptoe award-winning Young Adult novel, When I Was The Greatest (2015).

Themes/Style
While Reynolds wrote mostly poetry during his upbringing, he is known for his Young Adult novels. Reynolds main goal is to write books that he wished he saw in bookstores and bookshelves growing up. He writes about real-life expereinces, specifically in the African-American community, so that their stories are heard and recognized. On his website, he points out that he knows that there's "al lot --- A LOT -- of young people who hate reading. I know that many of these book haters are boys. I know that many of these book-hating boys, don't actually hate books, they hate boredom" [2 ]. He aims to write books that children, young adults, and adults will enjoy and will see themselves in the books that they're reading. Reynold's books are inspired by personal experiences including loss, pain, police brutality, social class, race, bullying, empathy, and identity.

Criticism
It was incredibly hard to find any criticisms on Jason Reynolds, especially because he is still a new, popular author and majority of the books that he has published are either award-winning or on the shortlist/finalist for awards coming up. What I can assume is that individuals might choose to not have his books in their classrooms/libraries because he writes about issues that deal with racism.

Other Information: Awards

 * 2015 John Steptoe New Talent Award
 * 2016 Finalist for National Book Award for Young People's Literature
 * 2016 Walter Dean Myers Award
 * 2016, 2017, 2018 Coretta Schott King Award honor
 * 2017 NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literary Work for Youth/Teen
 * 2018 Newbery Honor
 * 2018 Printz Honor Book
 * 2018 Finalist for NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literary Work for Youth/Teen
 * 2018 Edgar Award, best young adult work
 * 2019 finalist for National Book Award for Young People's Literature