Jerry Spinelli

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Jerry Spinelli


Born
in Norristown, PA, The United States
February 01, 1941

Website

Genre


When Jerry Spinelli was a kid, he wanted to grow up to be either a cowboy or a baseball player. Lucky for us he became a writer instead.

He grew up in rural Pennsylvania and went to college at Gettysburg College and Johns Hopkins University. He has published more than 25 books and has six children and 16 grandchildren.
Jerry Spinelli began writing when he was 16 — not much older than the hero of his book Maniac Magee. After his high school football team won a big game, his classmates ran cheering through the streets — all except Spinelli, who went home and wrote a poem about the victory. When his poem was published in the local paper, Spinelli decided to become a writer instead of a major-league shortstop.

In most of his books, Spinelli writes
...more

Average rating: 3.8 · 629,817 ratings · 39,886 reviews · 100 distinct worksSimilar authors
Stargirl (Stargirl, #1)

3.77 avg rating — 330,202 ratings — published 2000 — 154 editions
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Maniac Magee

3.90 avg rating — 126,241 ratings — published 1990 — 35 editions
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Love, Stargirl (Stargirl, #2)

3.82 avg rating — 43,348 ratings — published 2007 — 16 editions
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Milkweed

4.01 avg rating — 30,432 ratings — published 2003 — 61 editions
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Loser

3.74 avg rating — 21,085 ratings — published 2002 — 57 editions
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Wringer

3.64 avg rating — 15,007 ratings — published 1997 — 61 editions
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Crash

3.80 avg rating — 12,993 ratings — published 1996 — 55 editions
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Eggs

3.60 avg rating — 10,803 ratings — published 2007 — 15 editions
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Jake and Lily

3.97 avg rating — 5,651 ratings — published 2012 — 6 editions
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Smiles to Go

3.77 avg rating — 5,251 ratings — published 2008 — 7 editions
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More books by Jerry Spinelli…
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3.68 avg rating — 2,132 ratings

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3.75 avg rating — 51 ratings

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Quotes by Jerry Spinelli  (?)
Quotes are added by the Goodreads community and are not verified by Goodreads. (Learn more)

“She was elusive. She was today. She was tomorrow. She was the faintest scent of a cactus flower, the flitting shadow of an elf owl. We did not know what to make of her. In our minds we tried to pin her to a cork board like a butterfly, but the pin merely went through and away she flew.”
Jerry Spinelli, Stargirl

“Live today. Not yesterday. Not tomorrow. Just today. Inhabit your moments. Don’t rent them out to tomorrow. Do you know what you’re doing when you spend a moment wondering how things are going to turn out with Perry?

You’re cheating yourself out of today. Today is calling to you, trying to get your attention, but you’re stuck on tomorrow, and today trickles away like water down a drain. You wake up the next morning and that today you wasted is gone forever. It’s now yesterday. Some of those moments may have had wonderful things in store for you , but now you’ll never know.”
Jerry Spinelli, Love, Stargirl

“You’ll know her more by your questions than by her answers. Keep looking at her long enough. One day you might see someone you know.”
Jerry Spinelli, Stargirl

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Topics Mentioning This Author

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