Author Kelly Bennett
Kelly Goldman Bennett loves sharing stories—both fiction and non-fiction.
They say the first thing she did, after being born, was to voice her opinion—loudly!
Her love of writing can be traced back to 1960, when she was two-ish, and used her mother’s black mascara and lipstick to write on the neighbor’s car! (And maybe blamed it on her brother…although she says he blamed it on her.)
She has been telling stories and writing ever since.
She writes picture books for shorter humans and their adults to share; stories celebrating families, dancing, friends, pets, and all that goes into being a kid! Most recently, YOUR MOMMY WAS JUST LIKE YOU and YOUR DADDY WAS JUST LIKE YOU (Putnam/Penguin); DAD AND POP (Candlewick Press), winner of 2010 NAPPA Honors and Library Media Connection's Editor's Choice Award, DANCE, Y'ALL, DANCE (Bright Sky Press), a rhyming, two-stepping romp; and NOT NORMAN: A GOLDFISH STORY (Candlewick Press), named the Texas Institute of Letters Friends of Austin Public Library's Best Children's Book for 2005, a Children's Choice Award, and Oppenheim Toy Portfolio Gold Medal winner.
And for grown-up humans Kelly writes newspaper and magazine articles, mostly musings and travel pieces, and weekly blog entries at Kelly’s Fishbowl. She’s also a regular contributor to Now! Jakarta magazine.
At the moment, Kelly is obsessed with creating picture books. “Picture books are like icebergs,” she notes, “so much of what goes on goes unseen.” And revising picture book text is a lot like carving an ice sculpture. “I start with a big, messy jumble of words, pages of words, blocks of words, and just start chipping away. When I’m finished, I hope what’s left is as pure and simply stated as I can write it.” While she’s chipping away, Kelly imagines pictures to go with her words—but she never shares them. Instead, she strives to leave lots of space in her stories for the illustrator to fill with art.
A native of California, Kelly was born in Santa Cruz, with saltwater in her ears and the sound of the sea humming through her veins. She attended five grammar schools in California and Pennsylvania before fifth grade when her family settled in Orange County, a mile from the ocean. After graduating from Huntington Beach High School, Kelly earned an Associate of Arts Degree in Liberal Arts from Fullerton College. She continued her education at California State University, Fullerton (CSUF), and San Jose State University (SJSU), where she majored in Communications, and at Tulsa Community College and various Continuing Education Programs, where she focused on writing.
Kelly is a graduate of the Vermont College Master of Fine Arts in Writing for Children and Young Adults program. An active member of the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators (SCBWI), the American Library Association (ALA), the Texas Library Association (TLA), the International Reading Association (IRA), and the Author’s Guild, she participates in many workshops and conferences.
After learning how to write words (and that writing with paper, pens, pencils, and computers was safer than using her mother’s makeup), Kelly took to writing her feelings rather than speaking them aloud—a practice she believes led her to the writing life she enjoys today. Her greatest inspiration springs from adventures with her children, Max and Alexis, and her husband, Curtis.
Kelly divides her time between Jakarta, Indonesia and Houston, Texas.
