Maureen Johnson is On the Case

First Draft Episode #232: Maureen Johnson

Maureen Johnson is the New York Times bestselling author of
several YA novels, including 13 Little Blue Envelopes, Suite
Scarlett, The Name of the Star, and Truly Devious: A Mystery. She
has also done collaborative works, such as Let It Snow (with John
Green and Lauren Myracle), and The Bane Chronicles (with
Cassandra Clare and Sarah Rees Brennan).


Links and Topics Mentioned In This Episode


The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin

The Hound of the Baskervilles by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

The Something Queer series, written by Elizabeth Levy and
illustrated by Mordicai Gerstein, included Something Queer is
Going On (A Mystery), Something Queer at the Library, Something
Queer in Outer Space, and more

The Encyclopedia Brown series by Donald J. Sobol

One day Maureen plans to pursue writing non-fiction and
humorous essays, like David Sedaris, author of Me Talk Pretty One
Day, Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim, and When You Are
Engulfed in Flames

Maureen’s friend and agent is Kate Testerman with KT Literary

Janklow & Nesbit Associates is the literary agency where
Kate worked her way up before moving and forming her own agency

Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants by Ann Brashears and Sarah
Dessen books, including Saint Anything, Once and For All, and her
newest, The Rest of the Story  (hear Sarah Dessen’s episode
of First Draft here) were the only YA books around when Maureen
started watching

After John Green’s The Fault in Our Stars was turned into a
movie by the same name, his other books Paper Towns and Looking
for Alaska were also optioned and turned into a movie and TV
show. Then came Let It Snow with Lauren Myracle and Maureen
Jonhson, now available on Netflix!

Some of the crew of YA writers who wrote with Maureen in New
York when they were beginning their careers included: John Green;
Emily Jenkins a.k.a. E. Lockhart, author of The Disreputable
History of Frankie Landau-Banks; We Were Liars, and the
forthcoming Again Again; Cassandra Clare, #1 New York Times
bestselling author of The Mortal Instruments series, The Dark
Artifices series, and the forthcoming Chain of Gold, which kicks
off the Last Hours series; Robin Wasserman, author of Girls on
Fire, and the forthcoming Mother Daughter Widow Wife (listen to
her First Draft episode here); Holly Black, author of The Cruel
Prince series, The Coldest Girl in Coldtown and more (listen to
her First Draft episode here); Scott Westerfeld, author of Uglies
and Leviathan; Justine Larbalestier, author of Liar.

I can’t miss an opportunity to dig at the ending of Lost

Knives Out is a great example of a mystery. Go watch Knives
Out!



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Every Tuesday, I speak to storytellers like Veronica Roth, author
of Divergent; Linda Holmes, author and host of NPR’s Pop Culture
Happy Hour podcast; Jonny Sun, internet superstar, illustrator of
Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Gmorning, Gnight! and author and illustrator
of Everyone’s an Aliebn When Ur a Aliebn Too;  Michael
Dante  DiMartino, co-creator of Avatar: The Last Airbender;
John August, screenwriter of Big Fish, Charlie’s Angels, and
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory; or Rhett Miller, musician and
frontman for The Old 97s. Together, we take deep dives on their
careers and creative works.


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