One to Read:
Tae Keller
by Melissa Fales • photo by Saavedra Photography
Jennifer Chan is the awkward, new girl in school in Jennifer Chan Is Not Alone, the latest middle-grade book by Newbery Award Winner Tae Keller. Jennifer is already having trouble fitting in, but once she professes her belief in aliens, she’s shunned by her classmates. Then, Jennifer goes missing. “Her friend-turned-bully, Mallory Moss, may be the only one who can find her,” says Keller, “but to find her, Mallory must make new friends, dig into alien research, and confront the hard truths about what she did—and the lasting consequences.”
It’s not surprising that Keller was drawn to pursue a career as a writer. Some of her earliest memories from her childhood in Hawaii are of watching her mother, an author, sitting at her desk and writing novels. “I’d grab a stack of construction paper and markers and scribble stories of my own, all the while thinking, ‘Look at us, two novelists, working together,’” Keller says. “From an early age, I knew being a writer was possible, and my family always supported that path. That’s a great privilege, one I’m very grateful for.”
Keller has had a lifelong affinity for books and holds a special fondness for the first books she was able to read on her own: Mary Pope Osborne’s Magic Tree House series. “Reading those felt so empowering,” she says. “I could escape into different worlds, all on my own. What magic! That feeling never went away.” If anything, that feeling only intensified as Keller matured as a reader and started devoting time to writing. “Stories were always my safe place,” she says. “They were a way for me to both escape from my real life and process it.”
At first, Keller wrote for her eyes only. “I wrote so many stories just for myself before I considered publishing them for other people, but when I wrote The Science of Breakable Things, it felt different,” she says. “I finally had a story I wanted to share with others.” Keller’s debut novel, The Science of Breakable Things, released in 2018, is about a girl named Natalie who hopes that her seventh-grade science project will be the key to helping her mother escape her severe depression. “There’s an egg drop, a frog dissection, and a magical flower,” says Keller. “And while some of the themes are quite heavy, it’s probably the funniest book I’ve written.”
The Science of Breakable Things is about a girl in middle school, which was a departure from the high-school age characters Keller had previously written about and reflected a major change in perspective. “Middle grade felt different,” she says. “I was able to tap into that 12-year-old version of me, when the world felt new, and every emotion felt raw. When I write from that place, I can be as honest as my stories need me to be.”
In 2020, Keller released When You Trap a Tiger. The book features a magical big cat, straight out of ancient Korean folklore. “It’s about a girl named Lily who has grown up with her grandmother’s—her halmoni’s—Korean fairy tales, stories of trickster tigers and smart little girls,” says Keller. “Like most kids, she believes those stories are just stories ... until one of those tigers appears in front of her and offers her a deal. When You Trap a Tiger is a book about family, friendship, and learning the stories of where you came from.” Keller describes the moment she learned that When You Trap a Tiger won the 2021 Newbery Award as “surreal” and says it’s something that she’ll never forget. “I could not make my brain believe it,” she says. “Even after I got the call, I thought maybe I’d hallucinated it. Since then, it has started to sink in, and I feel overwhelmingly grateful.”
“I want biracial kids to be able to see themselves and their families reflected in my books. And I want readers of all different backgrounds to be able to empathize with my characters, too—to see that even though there are differences in how people grew up and how they see the world, ultimately, we’re all people. We’re all navigating triumphs and trials. We all feel love and fear and hope. And, perhaps, those differences aren’t so insurmountable after all.”
Keller’s new book, Jennifer Chan Is Not Alone, touches on the challenges of fitting in in middle school despite the social hierarchies and cliques. It’s a topic close to Keller’s heart as she herself was bullied when she was in middle school. “On the surface, it’s a story about ‘mean girls,’ but I wanted to go deeper,” Keller says. “The way Mallory and her friends treat Jennifer is certainly mean, and never get a pass for that. But I also wanted to show the ways we can all grow and become better versions of ourselves, if we try, if we let ourselves.” For Keller, Jennifer Chan Is Not Alone gave her the opportunity to touch two types of kids. “I wanted to give kids who are bullied, like Jennifer, reassurance that things will get better,” she says. “And I also wanted to give kids like Mallory a path forward from their mistakes, a healthier way to see themselves than ‘bully’ or ‘mean girl.’ I hope kids know that there are others who have experienced similar things and have made it through. Middle school can be hard, but there’s so much good still to come.”
In November, look for the first book in a new series by Keller called Mihi Ever After. “It’s got fractured fairy tales, nearsighted mice, enchanted rivers, and zombified ladies-in-waiting,” she says. “It’s exactly the kind of book I would have wanted when I was eight, and I’m having a lot of fun with it.” Keller says she intentionally sets out to make her books inclusive and relatable to all of her young readers. “I want biracial kids to be able to see themselves and their families reflected in my books,” she says. “And I want readers of all different backgrounds to be able to empathize with my characters, too—to see that even though there are differences in how people grew up and how they see the world, ultimately, we’re all people. We’re all navigating triumphs and trials. We all feel love and fear and hope. And, perhaps, those differences aren’t so insurmountable after all.”
For more about Tae Keller and her books, visit taekeller.com.