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Author

Ann Rinaldi

1934–2021

19 fiction

Ann Rinaldi (1934–2021) was an American journalist and award-winning author best known for her historical fiction for young adults. Born in New York City and raised in New Brunswick, New Jersey, she began her professional writing career as a newspaper columnist and feature writer, working for the Somerset Messenger Gazette and later the Trentonian. Her interest in historical fiction developed through her family’s participation in American Revolutionary War re-enactments, which introduced her to historic battlefields, period customs and material culture. After publishing two contemporary novels, she established her reputation with Time Enough for Drums in 1986 and left journalism in 1991 to write fiction full-time. Over her career, she produced forty-nine young-adult novels, most of them set during important periods of American history.

Rinaldi’s novels are distinguished by detailed historical research, strong family relationships and young female protagonists whose personal experiences illuminate larger events. Her work ranges across the Salem witch trials, the American Revolution, slavery, the Civil War and the lives of prominent historical families. Notable books include A Break with Charity, The Last Silk Dress, In My Father’s House, An Acquaintance with Darkness, The Coffin Quilt, Numbering All the Bones, Wolf by the Ears and Taking Liberty, which tells the story of Oney Judge, an enslaved woman who escaped from George Washington’s household. Eight of Rinaldi’s historical novels were named Best Books for Young Adults by the American Library Association, reflecting her importance in making complex and sometimes troubling episodes of history accessible to younger readers.

Periods and events

Battle of Gettysburg Lady Jane Grey Succession Crisis Progressive Era America, 1890–1920

Historical fiction

Standalone historical fiction by Ann Rinaldi (19 books)

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