Alice Hoffman was born in New York City on March 16, 1952 and grew up on Long Island. After graduating from high school in 1969, she attended Adelphi University, from which she received a BA, and then received a Mirrellees Fellowship to the Stanford University Creative Writing Center, which she attended in 1973 and 74, receiving an MA in creative writing.

Hoffman¹s first novel, PROPERTY OF, was written at the age of twenty-one, while she was studying at Stanford, and published shortly thereafter by Farrar Straus and Giroux. Ms. Hoffman credits her mentor, professor and writer Albert J. Guerard and his wife, the writer Maclin Bocock Guerard, for helping her to publish her first short story in the magazine FICTION. Editor Ted Solotaroff then contacted her to ask if she had a novel, at which point she quickly began to write what was to become PROPERTY OF, a section of which was published in Mr. Solotaroff¹s magazine, AMERICAN REVIEW. Hoffman has been represented by Elaine Markson of the Elaine Markson Agency for the past twenty-five years. Hoffman is married, lives outside Boston, and is the mother of two sons.

Alice Hoffman has published a total of fourteen novels, one book of short fiction, and four books for children. Her novel, HERE ON EARTH, an Oprah Book Club choice, was a modern reworking of some of the themes of Emily Bronte¹s masterpiece WUTHERING HEIGHTS. PRACTICAL MAGIC was Warner¹s film starring Sandra Bullock and Nicole Kidman. Ms. Hoffman¹s novel, AT RISK, which concerns a family dealing with AIDS, can be found on the reading lists of many universities, colleges and secondary schools. All of the author¹s advance from LOCAL GIRLS (G.P. Putnam and Berkley Books), a collection of inter-related fictions about love and loss on Long Island, have been donated to help create a breast cancer center outside of Boston. Hoffman's most recent books are AQUAMARINE and INDIGO, novels for pre-teens, and The New York Times bestsellers THE RIVER KING, and BLUE DIARY. GREEN ANGEL, a post-apocolyptic fairy tale, is being published this year by Scholastic. In July, 2003, Doubleday will publish her newest novel, THE PROBABLE FUTURE a search for love, destiny, and the perfect rose.

Hoffman¹s work has been published in more than twenty translations and more than one hundred foreign editions. Her novels have received mention as notable books of the year by The New York Times, Entertainment Weekly, The Los Angeles Times, Library Journal, and People Magazine. Ms. Hoffman has also worked as a screenwriter for nearly twenty years and is the author of the original screenplay INDEPENDENCE DAY, a film starring Kathleen Quinlan and Diane Weist. Hoffman¹s short fiction and non-fiction have appeared in The New York Times, The Boston Globe Magazine, Kenyon Review, Boulevard, Redbook, Architectural Digest, Gourmet, Premier, Self, Southwestern Review and many other magazines as well as the anthologies FAMILY and THIRTY-THREE THINGS EVERY GIRL SHOULD KNOW and CAPE COD STORIES.

-Biography from AliceHoffman.com, my first suggestion for finding out more about this author.

You can find an interview from Creative Parents with Alice Hoffman here - about children, parenting, and her young adult/children's books.

You can find additional articles on her at the New York Times site - you have to sign up, but it is free.