Short Bio
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.
Which books? NORMAN ONE AMAZING GOLDFISH & NOT NORMAN, featuring our finny fish friend, Norman T Goldfish, illustrated by Noah Z Jones; THE HOUSE THAT RUTH BUILT—baseball, Babe Ruth & Yankee Stadium; VAMPIRE BABY about a biting baby sister/vampire; DAD AND POP an Ode to Fathers & Stepfathers; ONE DAY I WENT RAMBLING celebrating imaginative play; DANCE, Y’ALL, DANCE, a two-steppin’ twirlin’ dance hall tale; YOUR DADDY WAS JUST LIKE YOU & YOUR MOMMY WAS JUST LIKE YOU, the truth about parents; and POETRY LAB, 7-Minute Poetry Prompts you can find—and try!—on her blog, Kelly’s Fishbowl.
What’s more: Kelly is graduate of VCFA’s Writing for Children and Young Adults program, and long-standing member of SCBWI (former ARA for SCBWI-Houston) & The Author’s Guild. She lives, gardens, bikes, cooks, creates from her base in Westhampton Beach, NY; Houston, TX; & Mimiville (which is anywhere my grandboys may be).
Kelly Bennett loves sharing stories. They say the first thing she did, after being born, was to voice her opinion — loudly!
Want to hear how loud? Listen to Kelly pronounce her name on TeachingBooks.net. (You might have to turn up the volume.)
Want more? Click on to this biting interview by JeanBookNerd.
Still more… Kelly chats about career, inspiration, frustration & Houston’s Funeral Museum & Trolley Rides with SHOUTOUT HTX
That little girl??!
Long . . . Long . . . Long Bio
Kelly's love of writing can be traced back to 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.
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.
She writes picture books for children to share; stories celebrating families, dancing, friends, pets, and all that goes into being a kid! These include Vampire Baby (Candlewick Press); One Day I Went Rambling (Bright Sky Press), Character Counts Silver Medalist and winner of the Writer's League of Texas Best Picture Book Award; Your Mommy Was Just Like You and Your Daddy Was Just Like You (G.P. Putnam-Penguin), called "Perfect for intergenerational lap dancing"; 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, a Children's Choice Award, and Oppenheim Toy Portfolio Gold Medal winner, Jumpstart’s 2015 Read for the Record Selection, shared by more than 3 million people worldwide and, a new adventure with our finny friend Norman One Amazing Goldfish which backstroked into bookstores fall 2020.
For writers of all ages and curious kids, check out Poetry Lab: 7-Minute Poetry Prompts. And not to be left out of any free swim, Norman T Goldfish answers questions from kids at Ask Norman! Both are on her blog: Kelly's Fishbowl.
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.”
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.
“While I’m writing,” says Kelly, “every story is a mystery — a mystery waiting to be solved. And who doesn’t love a good mystery?”
Sometimes, the real mystery is “What NAME will Kelly use on this book?”
Some of the names Kelly has written under are Kelly Goldman, Kelly Bennett, Patty McAndrews, Kelly Goldman Bennett and Jill Max, the pseudonym used for work co-written with Ronnie Davidson, her writing partner of 20+ years.
In between walks, movies, and frequent snack breaks the writing team of “Jill Max” created puzzles, stories, poems, riddles, parenting and travel articles, which have been published as books and in adult and children’s magazines.