David Klass | |
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| Born | Vermont, United States |
| Occupation | Novelist, screenwriter |
| Education | Leonia High School Yale University (BA) USC School of Cinematic Arts |
| Genre | Screenwriting, thrillers, young adult fiction |
David Klass is an American screenwriter and novelist. He has written more than 40 screenplays for Hollywood studios and published 14 young adult novels. His screenplays are primarily character-based thrillers for adults, while his novels often tell the stories of teenagers in crisis.
Klass was born in Vermont and raised in Leonia, New Jersey, the son of Sheila Solomon Klass, English professor and author, and Dr. Morton Klass, professor of anthropology at Barnard College and the brother of Dr. Perri Klass, a pediatrician, author, educator, and a contributing columnist for The New York Times . His uncle was science fiction author Philip Klass, who wrote under the name William Tenn.
Klass attended Leonia High School. [1] He received his BA in History from Yale University in 1982 and later graduated from USC School of Cinema-Television (1989). [2] Klass lives in New York City with his wife, Giselle Benatar, and their two children. [3]
Klass’s writing career began with the novel The Atami Dragons, inspired by his experiences as an English teacher in Japan. [3] His 1994 book California Blue gathered very positive reviews for its quiet yet compelling treatment of environmental issues. [4] In 2001 Klass published You don’t know me , which uses an edgy first-person narrative to tell the story of a teenage boy’s life with an abusive stepfather-to-be. The book has been published in 18 languages, was named an ALA Best Book For Young Adults, and continues to be popular with young adult audiences in the United States and internationally. [5]
Firestorm is the first book of the Caretaker Trilogy, a series of science fiction thrillers with an ecological theme. Firestorm was the first book ever endorsed by Greenpeace [6] [7] and was praised by critics for its combination of entertainment value and environmental message, garnering an American Library Association (ALA) Best Book citation, [8] a starred review from Publishers Weekly , [9] and a favorable review by The New York Times Book Review. [10] The story focuses on Jack Danielson, a teenager sent back from the future to save the world’s oceans.
Whirlwind, the second book in the Caretaker Trilogy, tells the story of Jack’s efforts to save the Amazon rain forest; published in March 2008 by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. The third book in the trilogy is Timelock, published in fall 2009. [11]
Firestorm has been optioned by Warner Bros. and the production company Thunder Road. A screenplay for the movie version is now in active development. [6]
Out of Time is an adult novel about a talented young FBI agent in pursuit of an ecoterrorist.<Tom Nolan, Wall Street Journal, July 11, 2020 >
Klass has also written more than 40 Hollywood screenplays, including the adaptation of James Patterson's Kiss the Girls for the movie version starring Morgan Freeman and Ashley Judd. [12] His most recent produced screenplay was the remake of Walking Tall starring The Rock. [13] Klass wrote the screenplay for the thriller Desperate Measures starring Michael Keaton and Andy García, which was based on his original idea. [14] With his sister, playwright and Truman Scholar [15] Judy Klass, he adapted Julia Alvarez's novel In the Time of the Butterflies into the 2001 movie starring Salma Hayek and Edward James Olmos. [16]
Madeleine L'Engle was an American writer of fiction, non-fiction, poetry, and young adult fiction, including A Wrinkle in Time and its sequels: A Wind in the Door, A Swiftly Tilting Planet, Many Waters, and An Acceptable Time. Her works reflect both her Christian faith and her strong interest in modern science.
A Wrinkle in Time is a young adult science fantasy novel written by American author Madeleine L'Engle. First published in 1962, the book won the Newbery Medal, the Sequoyah Book Award, the Lewis Carroll Shelf Award, and was runner-up for the Hans Christian Andersen Award. The main characters – Meg Murry, Charles Wallace Murry, and Calvin O'Keefe – embark on a journey through space and time, from galaxy to galaxy, as they endeavor to rescue the Murrys' father and fight back The Black Thing that has intruded into several worlds.
Farrar, Straus and Giroux (FSG) is an American book publishing company, founded in 1946 by Roger Williams Straus Jr. and John C. Farrar. FSG is known for publishing literary books, and its authors have won numerous awards, including Pulitzer Prizes, National Book Awards, and Nobel Prizes. As of 2016 the publisher is a division of Macmillan, whose parent company is the German publishing conglomerate Holtzbrinck Publishing Group.
Frederick Seidel is an American poet.
Alice McDermott is an American writer and university professor. For her 1998 novel Charming Billy she won an American Book Award and the U.S. National Book Award for Fiction.
David Grossman is an Israeli author. His books have been translated into more than 30 languages.
Laurie Halse Anderson is an American writer, known for children's and young adult novels. She received the Margaret A. Edwards Award from the American Library Association in 2010 for her contribution to young adult literature and 2023 she received the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award.
Donald Heiney was a sailor and academic as well as a prolific and inventive writer using the pseudonym of MacDonald Harris for fiction.
A firestorm is a fire that creates its own wind system.
The Time Quintet is a fantasy/science fiction series of five young adult novels written by Madeleine L'Engle.
Robert Giroux was an American book editor and publisher. Starting his editing career with Harcourt, Brace & Co., he was hired away to work for Roger W. Straus, Jr. at Farrar & Straus in 1955, where he became a partner and, eventually, its chairman. The firm was henceforth known as Farrar, Straus and Giroux, where he was known by his nickname, "Bob".
The Caretaker Trilogy is a series of science fiction thrillers with an ecological theme, written for young adults by David Klass. The first book in the series, Firestorm (2006), was the first book ever endorsed by Greenpeace and was praised by critics for its combination of entertainment value and environmental message, garnering an American Library Association (ALA) Best Book citation, a starred review from Publishers Weekly, and a favorable review by the New York Times Book Review. The story focuses on Jack Danielson, a teenager sent back from the future to save the world’s oceans. Whirlwind, the second book in the Caretaker Trilogy, tells the story of Jack’s efforts to save the Amazon rain forest; published in March 2008 by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. The third book in the trilogy is Timelock, published in 2009.
Perri Klass is an American pediatrician and writer who has published extensively about her medical training and pediatric practice. Among her subjects have been the issues of women in medicine, relationships between doctors and patients, and children and literacy. She is the author of both fiction and nonfiction novels, stories, essays, and journalism. Klass is Professor of Journalism and Pediatrics at New York University, and Medical Director of Reach Out and Read, a national childhood literacy program that works through doctors and nurses to encourage parents to read aloud to young children, and to give them the books they need to do it. She is a member of the National Advisory Council of the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development and has been nominated by the President of the United States to the Advisory Board of the National Institute For Literacy.
Albert Watkins Key, Jr., publishing under the name Watt Key and Albert Key, is an American fiction author who is known for writing young-adult survival fiction. A resident of Alabama, his debut novel Alabama Moon was published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux in 2006 and was the 2007 winner of the E.B. White Read-Aloud Award for older readers. It received a 2006 Parents' Choice Award. Alabama Moon has been translated and published in eight languages. In 2015 Alabama Moon was listed by TIME Magazine as one of the top 100 young-adult books of all time.
Marie K. Rutkoski in Hinsdale, Illinois is an American children's writer, and professor at Brooklyn College. She has three younger siblings. She graduated from the University of Iowa with a B.A. in English with a minor in French in 1999, and then her English M.A. and Ph.D. from Harvard University in 2003 and 2006 respectively. She lives in Brooklyn with her family and two cats, Cloud and Firefly.
Jessica Brody is an American author and writing educator. Her writing consists mainly of young adult fiction.
That Night (1987) is the second novel by American author Alice McDermott, published in 1987 by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. The novel was a Finalist for both the Pulitzer Prize in 1988 and the National Book Award in 1987.
Aaron Starmer is an American author of young adult fiction novels, known for The Riverman Trilogy and Spontaneous. As of June 2016, he was working on another novel, entitled Meme. In 2016, it was reported that Awesomeness Films had bought the rights to adapt Spontaneous into a movie of the same name, which was released in 2020. He has also co-authored a book about camping along with Catharine Wells and Timothy Starmer. Also in 2016, Starmer appeared at the annual Texas Book Festival.
Peter Handke is an Austrian novelist, playwright, translator, poet, film director, and screenwriter.
17. Tom Nolan, Wall Street Journal, July 11, 2020
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