SUSAN LURIE

Children’s Book Author

ABOUT

I was born in Brooklyn, New York. What a great place to grow up!

My best friend lived right across the street. After school, we’d roller skate, ride our bikes, or play stoop ball. Winters, we were mountain climbers, conquering curbside snow peaks. Summers, we thawed out on Manhattan Beach during the day and watched the fireworks at night at Coney Island! Great, right?

Two of my favorite places in Brooklyn were the Brooklyn Botanic Garden—I still go there whenever I get a chance!—and the Brooklyn Public Library. When I was a kid, the library allowed you to check out only six books at a time, but in the summer, they let you take out TEN books at once! I was never, ever without a book. My favorite authors when I was in elementary school were Beverly Cleary and E.B. White.

When I was in the third grade, I wrote a book review that the library published along with other kids’ book reviews. It was very exciting to be published! After that, I wrote more and more—but it was many, many, many years before I got published again!

I live in Forest Hills, New York, now. That’s in the borough of Queens.

If you come to Queens, look for me riding my bike in Flushing Meadow Park around the Unisphere!

When my husband and I take a break from work, we like to go upstate to the Catskill Mountains so we can walk in the woods. We love exploring, but we both have a terrible sense of direction. We get lost everywhere—even in parking lots, not kidding.

In addition to writing, I’m a book editor. One of the book series I edit is R.L. Stine’s Goosebumps. I’ve edited more than 150 Goosebumps books, and I always look forward to reading and working on the next one!

When I was in elementary school, I wanted a superpower… and then, in the third grade, I found one. I turned into a super reader. Books took me places I had always dreamed of and places I had never imagined. And they were the perfect way to leave my worries behind for awhile.

Is there anything more magical than a book? I don’t think so. Where else can you lose yourself and find yourself at the same time? I hope reading is one of your superpowers, too.