Jeffrey Scott Savage | |
---|---|
Born | Oakland, California, U.S. | January 31, 1963
Pen name | J. Scott Savage Jeffrey S. Savage |
Occupation | Author |
Alma mater | Sierra College West Valley College Utah Valley University |
Period | 2001–present |
Genre | Middle grade fiction Fantasy |
Notable works | Water Keep Land Keep Zombie Kid Dark Memories |
Spouse | Jennifer Savage |
Children | 4 |
Website | |
JScottSavage.com JeffreySavage.com |
Jeffrey Scott Savage (born January 31, 1963) is an American author of fantasy, horror, mystery, and suspense. As of 2020, he has published 19 novels, including the FarWorld fantasy series, the Case File 13 series, the Mysteries of Cove series, and the Shandra Covington series, as well as several stand-alone titles. Savage was born and raised in northern California and studied computer science at Sierra College and West Valley College in California and Utah Valley University in Utah. He worked in the software industry before deciding to write full-time. He writes middle grade and young adult fiction under the pen name J. Scott Savage and works intended for adult readers as Jeffrey S. Savage. He won the 2013 Whitney Award for Best Speculative Novel for Dark Memories.
Jeffrey Scott Savage was born in Oakland, California, on January 31, 1963. [1] He grew up in northern California, [1] and enjoyed readings books such as A Wrinkle in Time , The Outsiders, and The Lord of the Rings . [2] Savage has said that he was "the kid who would cut school and go to the library." [3] : 9:21 Savage would make up stories to tell to his cousins during his childhood years. [4] One of his first storytelling memories took place while fishing in the Sierra Nevada mountains, when he made up a tale about "a superhero hot dog known as Capt. Weenie and his arch villain, a little purple man" that his relatives loved. [5] In high school, Savage wrote a story for his final project in psychology class instead of completing the suggested assignment, but earned an A. [5]
Savage attended Sierra College, West Valley College, and Utah Valley University, studying computer science. During the Great Recession, he lost his job in a software company. Though he was offered another job in the software industry, Savage decided to write full-time and be an author. [5]
At the most base level, I write because it makes me happy. It's like a spigot I can open up to release all the creativity that has been building up inside my brain. But I also write because there's a specific story I need to tell. —J. Scott Savage [2]
Savage originally decided to write middle grade fantasy after an idea kept him awake one night. After writing for five hours, he felt convinced that he could write for children. [6] He has said that he enjoys writing for middle grade readers because "between the ages of 8-13, everything around you is magic." [2] He wrote the middle-grade fantasy series FarWorld, [7] comprising Water Keep (2008), Land Keep (2009), Air Keep (2013), and Fire Keep (2015). [8] The series follows the fantastical adventures of Marcus, a boy in a wheelchair who dreams of a magical world that is actually a reality, [4] and Kyja, a girl who can't perform magic like everyone else around her. [9] Savage visited over 300 schools to promote Water Keep after its release. [5] Sharon Haddock at Deseret News mentioned that Air Keep "requires suspension of reality" but was "fine for its audience." [9]
On December 26, 2012, Savage's first book in the Case File 13 series, entitled Zombie Kid, was released. [10] The series follows a group of kids who love Halloween and all things spooky who encounter zombies, mad scientists, and curses. [3] : 16:09 Kirkus Reviews wrote that the book was "the perfect balance between rib-tickling humor and bone-chilling adventure". [10] Kirkus later called Zombie Kid's sequel, Making the Team (2013), "another thoroughly satisfying thrill ride." [11] The Case File 13 series expanded to include Evil Twins (2014) and Curse of the Mummy's Uncle (2015). [12]
His idea for Fires of Invention originated from the mechanical dragon that appears in the musical Wicked. [2] The novel follows two thirteen-year-old characters as they undertake a secret project to build a mechanical dragon in a town where creativity is against the law. [2] [13] It was a 2015 AML Award finalist in the middle grade novel category. [14] Savage expanded Fires of Invention into his Mysteries of Cove series with Gears of Revolution (2016) and Embers of Destruction (2017). [15] John Carlisle for the Deseret News called Gears of Revolution "an inspiring piece of literature for the middle-grade reader." [16] Both Fires of Invention and Fire Keep (part of the Farworld series) were Whitney Award finalists in 2015. [13] In 2020, Savage released The Lost Wonderland Diaries, [17] a book about two kids who discover Lewis Carroll's long-forgotten diaries documenting his trip to Wonderland. [18]
Savage has visited multiple elementary schools, speaking to kids about the main themes of his books and story writing techniques. [3] : 13:41 Of his school visits, Savage said that he usually leaves teachers with a creative writing exercise to use in the classroom. [3] : 14:45 Savage has also participated in the Writing and Illustrating for Young Readers Workshop. [19]
Savage has also authored additional works under the name Jeffrey S. Savage, the majority of which are mystery or suspense novels for adults. They include Cutting Edge (2001), Into the Fire (2002), House of Secrets (2005), Dead on Arrival (2006), A Time to Die (2010), The Fourth Nephite (2010), and Dark Memories (2013). [20] The "techno-thriller" Cutting Edge, Savage's debut novel, [21] follows a Latter-day Saint (LDS) programmer from Utah whose new job in Silicon Valley turns out to be more dangerous than expected. [22] House of Secrets, Dead on Arrival, and Time to Die are the three books that compose his Shandra Covington mystery series. [23] In a review for Meridian Magazine , Jennie Hansen applauded Savage's ability to write from the perspective of a female main character in his Shandra Covington series. [24] Savage's The Fourth Nephite is a Mormon fiction novel about a boy who finds himself in Palmyra, New York in 1827 and encounters Joseph Smith as he tries to protect the golden plates from robbers. [25] In an article about The Fourth Nephite, the Deseret News reported that "Savage said combining fantasy elements and the LDS Church into a novel is a tricky process, but he is satisfied with the result of his efforts." [26]
Savage first began drafting Dark Memories while he was working as a CEO during his many hours travelling. [27] Dark Memories was the first novel in the horror genre to be published by an LDS publishing house. [6] Kirk Shaw, an editor at Covenant Communications, encouraged Savage to send in his manuscript for Dark Memories, even though the company had never published a horror novel before. [28] Covenant agreed to publish Dark Memories. [28] Savage fought to preserve the novel's more horrific elements as it went through the editing process, [27] though he learned how to "let the scary stuff happen in the reader's head," imitating the style of filmmaker Alfred Hitchcock. [28] He described Dark Memories as "a kind of high-tech thriller." [27] A KSL.com report on the book called it "a fast-paced, well-written novel" with characters that "have real depth and are instantly likeable." [29] Dark Memories won the 2013 Whitney Award for Best Speculative Novel. [30]
Savage and his wife, Jennifer, have four children [5] and nine grandchildren. [7] He is a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. [1] As of 2013, he lived in Spanish Fork, Utah. [28] Savage has held numerous job in his life, including CEO of an internet company, plumber, French chef, mall Santa and radio talk show host. [1] On his website, he cites "reading, watching movies, camping, traveling, and spending time with his family" as his favorite activities. [7]
The Book of Omni is one of the books that make up the Book of Mormon, a text that the Latter Day Saint movement regards as scripture. The book is written as the combined composition of several authors, the first of whom, Omni, provides the name of the book. According to the narrative, the book covers more than two centuries of Nephite history within one chapter of text. It refers to wars between the Nephites and Lamanites, the reign of Kings Mosiah and Benjamin, and their participation in the wars and journeys through the wilderness.
Mormon fiction is generally fiction by or about members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, who are also referred to as Latter-day Saints or Mormons. Its history is commonly divided into four sections as first organized by Eugene England: foundations, home literature, the "lost" generation, and faithful realism. During the first fifty years of the church's existence, 1830–1880, fiction was not popular, though Parley P. Pratt wrote a fictional Dialogue between Joseph Smith and the Devil. With the emergence of the novel and short stories as popular reading material, Orson F. Whitney called on fellow members to write inspirational stories. During this "home literature" movement, church-published magazines published many didactic stories and Nephi Anderson wrote the novel Added Upon. The generation of writers after the home literature movement produced fiction that was recognized nationally but was seen as rebelling against home literature's outward moralization. Vardis Fisher's Children of God and Maurine Whipple's The Giant Joshua were prominent novels from this time period. In the 1970s and 1980s, authors started writing realistic fiction as faithful members of the LDS Church. Acclaimed examples include Levi S. Peterson's The Backslider and Linda Sillitoe's Sideways to the Sun. Home literature experienced a resurgence in popularity in the 1980s and 1990s when church-owned Deseret Book started to publish more fiction, including Gerald Lund's historical fiction series The Work and the Glory and Jack Weyland's novels.
James C. Christensen was an American illustrator and painter of religious and fantasy art.
Shannon Hale is an American author primarily of young adult fantasy, including the Newbery Honor book Princess Academy and The Goose Girl. Her first novel for adults, Austenland, was adapted into a film in 2013. She is a graduate of the University of Utah and the University of Montana. She has also co-written with her husband, Dean.
Chris Heimerdinger is an American author who has written twenty novels for adults and young adults, most famously the Tennis Shoes Adventure Series. He is a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and most of his stories center on religious themes familiar to Latter-day Saints.
Orson Scott Card is an American writer known best for his science fiction works. He is the only person to have won a Hugo Award and a Nebula Award in consecutive years, winning both awards for his novel Ender's Game (1985) and its sequel Speaker for the Dead (1986). A feature film adaptation of Ender's Game, which Card coproduced, was released in 2013. Card also wrote the Locus Fantasy Award-winning series The Tales of Alvin Maker (1987–2003).
The Orson Scott Card bibliography contains a list of works published by Orson Scott Card.
Betsy Brannon Green is a Latter Day Saint mystery/suspense novelist. She is a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Patrick "Pat" Bagley is an American editorial cartoonist and journalist for The Salt Lake Tribune in Salt Lake City, Utah, and an author and illustrator of several books.
Douglas H. Thayer was a prominent author in the "faithful realism" movement of Mormon fiction. He has been called the "Mormon Hemingway" for his straightforward style and powerful prose. Eugene England called him the "father of contemporary Mormon fiction."
The AML Awards are given annually by the Association for Mormon Letters (AML) to the best work "by, for, and about Mormons." They are juried awards, chosen by a panel of judges. Citations for many of the awards can be found on the AML website.
Levi Savage Peterson is a Mormon biographer, essayist and fictionist whose best-known works include a seminal biography of Juanita Brooks, his own autobiography, and his novel The Backslider, a "standard for the contemporary Mormon novel." He was born and reared in the Mormon community of Snowflake, Arizona and is an emeritus professor of English at Weber State University in Ogden, Utah. He served a mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in French-speaking Switzerland and Belgium from 1954 to 1957. He edited Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought from 2004 to 2008.
Christopher Everett Crowe is an American professor of English and English education at Brigham Young University (BYU) specializing in young adult literature. In addition to his academic work, Crowe also writes nonfiction and novels for young-adult readers, including Mississippi Trial, 1955.
Daniel Andrew Wells is an American horror and science fiction author. Wells's first published novel, I Am Not a Serial Killer, was adapted into a movie in 2016.
The Maze Runner is a 2009 dystopian novel by American author James Dashner. It takes place in a world suffering from a coronal mass ejection and whose surviving civilians fight to avoid an apocalyptic illness called the Flare. It is written from the perspective of Thomas, a 16-year-old boy who wakes up with no memories inside an artificially produced maze. An organization called WICKED controls the world politically, seeks a cure to the Flare, and uses the youngest generation of civilians who are immune to it as test subjects.
Allyson Braithwaite Condie is an author of young adult and middle grade fiction. Her novel Matched was a #1 New York Times and international bestseller, and spent over a year on the New York Times Bestseller List. The sequels are also New York Times bestsellers. Matched was chosen as one of YALSA's 2011 Teens' Top Ten and named as one of Publishers Weekly's Best Children's Books of 2010. All three books are available in 30+ languages.
Cedar Fort, Inc. is a large to mid-sized publisher based in Utah, USA. Founded in 1986 by Lyle Mortimer and Lee Nelson, Cedar Fort has evolved from a niche Latter-day Saints book publisher, to a national multimedia company, with offerings in film, audiobooks, art and gifts alongside its book catalog. In 2015, Publishers Weekly named Cedar Fort one of its top ten fastest growing publishers.
Charlie Nicholes Holmberg is an American fantasy writer best known for The Paper Magician series. She is from Salt Lake City, Utah, and graduated from Brigham Young University with a bachelor's degree in English in 2010. Her first novel, The Paper Magician, was released in 2014. Holmberg expanded the book into a series, the film rights for which were purchased by Disney in 2016. In addition to her other book series, Holmberg has published seven standalone novels. She is a multi-Whitney Award recipient for The Fifth Doll (2017), The Will and the Wilds (2020), Star Mother (2021), and Keeper of Enchanted Rooms (2022). The Hanging City was a 2023 Goodreads Choice Awards Finalist. Many of her other works have been nominated for literary awards as well. In addition to writing, Holmberg cohosts the podcast Your Mom Writes Books.
David John Butler is an American speculative fiction author. His epic flintlock fantasy novel Witchy Kingdom won the Dragon Award for Best Alternate History Novel in 2020. Witchy Winter won the 2018 AML Award for Best Novel and the 2018 Whitney Award for Best Speculative Fiction, and Witchy Eye was a preliminary nominee for the Gemmell Morningstar Award.
The Paper Magician is a 2014 fantasy novel by American writer Charlie N. Holmberg, published by 47North. It is Holmberg's debut novel and the first book in The Paper Magician series, followed by The Glass Magician (2014), The Master Magician (2015), and The Plastic Magician (2018). It follows apprentice magician Ceony Twill as she learns how to become a "Folder": one who manipulates paper through magic.
{{cite book}}
: |website=
ignored (help)