Sally is represented by Sara Crowe Lit.
Or you can email Sally directly at sallyjplawrites@gmail.com
Short Bio:
Sally J. Pla is the ALA Schneider Award-winning author of THE FIRE, THE WATER, AND MAUDIE McGINN as well as several other popular novels and picture books. Her books have been translated into other languages, have earned starred reviews and appeared on many state awards lists and “best books” roundups. Sally, who is late-diagnosed autistic, has appeared on television and radio as an author and neurodiversity advocate. She also runs the website resource A Novel Mind. Sally believes in kindness, respect, and the beauty of different brains. We are all stars shining with different lights! Visit her at sallyjpla.com.
Longer Bio:
Sally J. Pla is an award-winning children’s author and advocate. She is late-diagnosed autistic, and knows what it is like to be a kid that struggles. She is a neurodiversity advocate who believes in kindness, respect, and the beauty of all our different brains, because we are all stars shining with different lights.
Her novel The Fire, The Water, and Maudie McGinn won the 2024 ALA Schneider Award for its disability representation. It was called “a gorgeous, big-hearted, beautiful book” (Elana K. Arnold), “a vulnerable portrait of … personal traumas,” (starred review, PW), and “a beautiful book by a beautiful human” (M. Lewitin).
Sally’s debut novel, The Someday Birds, won the 2018 Dolly Gray Children’s Literature Award for its authentic portrayal of disability, was a Goodreads Choice Nominee, an Amazon Teachers’ Choice, a NYPL Best Book, Bank Street Best Book, LA Library Best Book, and Junior Library Guild Selection, among many other accolades and starred reviews. Booklist called it “a delight from beginning to end.” Nerdy Book Club called it “an instant classic.”
Her novel, Stanley Will Probably Be Fine, was a 2018 Kirkus Best Children’s Book, a Bank Street Best Book, a NYPL Best Book, and a Junior Library Guild Gold Standard Selection. “Add to the growing list of intelligent books about kids whose brains operate outside the norm,” said Kirkus in a starred review. Sally’s picture book, Benji, The Bad Day, & Me, won the 2019 San Diego Book Award, has a starred review from Booklist, and is a CCBC selection.
Sally is also editor and co-founder of A Novel Mind, a resource on mental health and neurodiversity representation in children’s literature. Librarians have called it “a gold mine” of helpful information.
Sally has written award-winning adult short fiction and her poetry’s included in No World Too Big (Charlesbridge 2023). Her essays and articles on family and on business have appeared over the years in The New York Times, The Miami Herald, The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, MetroParent Magazine, Management Review Magazine, and many business magazines and journals.
A writer’s residency at Hedgebrook started Sally on her later-in-life novel-writing journey. Previously, she was a business journalist, a special ed advocate, a school board president, a terrible backup singer, in a cafe-circuit band, a horribly clumsy waitress, a graveyard-shift front desk clerk— but, best of all, a loving mom to three sons.
Find out more at https://linktr.ee/SallyJPla or @sallyjpla.
