“People often ask me how and why I do both fiction and nonfiction,” says Kathryn Lasky. “ I am equally attracted to both types of writing because for me the most important thing is that a story be real. Real stories can be either fiction or nonfiction. Even in my nonfiction books, telling a story is more important than reciting the facts.

“I still don’t really know when I began thinking of myself as a real writer. It might have been relatively recently – like when I first got paid for a manuscript. But that might have been only when I first dared to call myself a writer to the world at large. I think that perhaps I always felt that this was my profession, announced or unannounced, paid or unpaid. I have always been a writer.”

Raised in Indianapolis, Indiana, Kathryn Lasky received a bachelor’s degree in English from the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor and a master’s degree in early childhood education from Wheelock College. She lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts, with her husband, Christopher Knight, and their two children, Max and Meribah.

Selected books written by Kathryn Lasky

Beyond the Burning Time
by Kathryn Lasky
Lasky's fictional recreation of the Salem witch trials.
Reading level: Young Adult

The Emperor's Old Clothes
by Kathryn Lasky, David Catrow (Illustrator)
A retelling of the familiar tale with a comical twist.
Reading level: Ages 4-8
School & Library Binding - 32 pages (March 21, 2000)

The Librarian Who Measured the Earth
by Kathryn Lasky, Kevin Hawkes (Illustrator)
The story of how Erathosthenes, the Greek mathematician and librarian, accurately measured the circumference of the earth more than two thousand years ago.
Reading level: Ages 4-8

The Most Beautiful Roof in the World : Exploring the Rainforest Canopy
by Kathryn Lasky, Christopher G. Knight (Illustrator)
Exploration of the rainforest canopy with biologist Meg Lowman.
Reading level: Ages 9-12

Marie Antoinette : Princess of Versailles Austria-France, 1769 (Royal Diaries) 
by Kathryn Lasky 
The story of Maria Antonia of Vienna who is to marry the Dauphine and become known forever as Marie Antoinette.
Reading level: Ages 9-12

Elizabeth I, Red Rose of the House of Tudor (Royal Diaries) 
by Kathryn Lasky 
The fictionalized diary of Elizabeth, Queen of England, from the age of eleven until the death of her father, Henry VIII, when she is almost thirteen.
Reading level: Ages 9-12