Background
Jewell Parker Rhodes was born in 1954, in Manchester.
1300 Nicholson St NW, Washington, DC 20011, United States
Jewell Parker Rhodes at Brightwood Education Campus
1300 Nicholson St NW, Washington, DC 20011, United States
Jewell Parker Rhodes at Brightwood Education Campus
5000 Forbes Ave, Pittsburgh, PA 15213, United States
Rhodes earned a Bachelor of Arts in Drama Criticism, a Master of Arts in English, and a Doctor of Arts in English (Creative Writing) from Carnegie Mellon University.
Jewell Parker Rhodes, American novelist, poses for a portrait on Day 2 of the FT Weekend Oxford Literary Festival on March 23, 2014 in Oxford, England.
Jewell Parker Rhodes reads an excerpt from Ghost Boys.
Jewell Parker Rhodes Visits PFTSTA.
The Patrick Taylor students are sitting in front of the author and the Iowans are on the screen.
(Jewell Parker Rhodes follows up her acclaimed Voodoo Drea...)
Jewell Parker Rhodes follows up her acclaimed Voodoo Dreams with a present-day mystery surrounding the gifts of an ancestor of the Voodoo Queen. Doctor Marie Levant can't explain why she's drawn to New Orleans, or why it's comforting and unsettling at the same time. And she can't shake her haunting dreams. But when she delivers a dead woman's baby, Marie knows malevolent forces are at work, and it's up to her to stop them.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000KHYMWU/?tag=2022091-20
2006
(In college and graduate school, Jewell Parker Rhodes neve...)
In college and graduate school, Jewell Parker Rhodes never encountered a single reading assignment or exercise that featured a person of color. Now she has made it her mission to rectify the situation, gathering advice and inspiring tips tailored for African Americans seeking to express their life experiences.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000FC1GGA/?tag=2022091-20
2002
(Jewell Parker Rhodes, who has earned legions of fans with...)
Jewell Parker Rhodes, who has earned legions of fans with her masterful fiction, launched her career as an award-winning novelist with Voodoo Dreams, based on the legend of New Orleans's most famous voodoo priestess, Marie Laveau. Voodoo Season, Rhodes's fourth novel, revisits the mystical landscape of Louisiana, but now, for the first time, the celebrated author of historical fiction presents a mystery set in the here and now. This is the story of Marie Levant, a great-great granddaughter of Marie Laveau and a medical doctor compelled by unseen forces to relocate from Chicago to her family's native home. This is New Orleans, where the slave-holding past merges with the twenty-first century, a place where women of color are still being abused, raped, and -- even more horrifying -- rendered "un-dead," zombie-like Sleeping Beauties. The Quadroon Balls of yesterday are a present reality and only Marie Levant can untangle the medical mystery. A smart modern-day heroine, unafraid of her sexuality, Marie Levant extends the Laveau legacy of spiritual empowerment, prophetic vision, and voodoo possession. Voodoo Season is a fresh and original work of fiction that is a magical womanist tale of mystery and power.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000FCKCEW/?tag=2022091-20
2005
(A jazzman, a wharf worker, a prostitute, all murdered. Wr...)
A jazzman, a wharf worker, a prostitute, all murdered. Wrists punctured, their bodies impossibly drained of blood. What connects them? Why are they rising as ghosts? Marie Levant, the great-great granddaughter of the Voodoo Queen, Marie Laveau, knows better than anyone New Orleans's brutal past - the legacy of slavery, poverty, racism, and sexism - and as a doctor at Charity Hospital's ER, she treats its current victims.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0017SUZT0/?tag=2022091-20
2008
(Twelve-year-old Lanesha lives in a tight-knit community i...)
Twelve-year-old Lanesha lives in a tight-knit community in New Orleans' Ninth Ward. She doesn't have a fancy house like her uptown family or lots of friends like the other kids on her street. But what she does have is Mama Ya-Ya, her fiercely loving caretaker, wise in the ways of the world and able to predict the future. So when Mama Ya-Ya's visions show a powerful hurricane--Katrina--fast approaching, it's up to Lanesha to call upon the hope and strength Mama Ya-Ya has given her to help them both survive the storm. From the New York Times bestselling author of Ghost Boys and Towers Falling, Ninth Ward is a deeply emotional story about transformation and a celebration of resilience, friendship, and family--as only love can define it.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B003JTHXVI/?tag=2022091-20
2010
(A Bird by Bird for the African-American market--A top-not...)
A Bird by Bird for the African-American market--A top-notch writer's guide filled with practical guidance, essays, and journal exercises for the African-American writer including advice from E.Lynn Harris, Charles Johnson, and Yolanda Joe.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B003IS76AS/?tag=2022091-20
2010
(The critically acclaimed author of Voodoo Dreams delivers...)
The critically acclaimed author of Voodoo Dreams delivers an inspired work of historical fiction about the warring passions that drove the great abolitionist Frederick Douglass and two women - one black, one white - who loved him.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B003QP4NNQ/?tag=2022091-20
2010
(Award-winning author of fiction and nonfiction Jewell Par...)
Award-winning author of fiction and nonfiction Jewell Parker Rhodes is a master of her craft, under-standing how both real and imagined stories can serve as a pathway to enlightenment. Porch Stories is Rhodes's tribute to her beloved grandmother, a real account of the love she received and the lessons she learned.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B003N3TU48/?tag=2022091-20
2010
(Dr. Marie Levant aka Leveau, great-great granddaughter of...)
Dr. Marie Levant aka Leveau, great-great granddaughter of Marie Laveau, has achieved fame and notoriety for saving New Orleans from the wrath of a vampire. Now she’s taking a break from the city, heading up the highway to DeLaire. She doesn’t know this backwater town, but an elderly woman called Nana has been expecting Marie to arrive and save her and others in this God-forsaken place from sickness and death. Yet all of Marie’s powers can’t bring life back to the corpses she finds in a house by the road. Nor can she force those who know how they died to say so or to confess. Were the crimes committed by shape-shifters, vampires, and ghosts - or by living men and women? And even as Marie searches for answers, a hurricane threatens to break the levees of Louisiana and cause unimaginable destruction.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0043RSJSQ/?tag=2022091-20
2011
(Tulsa, Oklahoma, 1921. A white woman and a black man are ...)
Tulsa, Oklahoma, 1921. A white woman and a black man are alone in an elevator. Suddenly, the woman screams, the man runs out, and the chase to capture and lynch him begins. When Joe, a young man trying to be the next Houdini, is accused of rape, he must perform his greatest escape by eluding a bloodthirsty lynch mob. And Mary, the motherless daughter of a farmer who tries to marry her off to the farmhand who viciously raped her, must find the courage to help exonerate the man she had accused with her panicked cry. Based on true events, Magic City is a portrait of an era, climaxing in the heroic but doomed stand that pitted the National Guard against a small band of black men determined to defend the town they had built into the "Negro Wall Street."
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B004HD62M6/?tag=2022091-20
2011
(Ten-year-old Sugar lives on the River Road sugar plantati...)
Ten-year-old Sugar lives on the River Road sugar plantation along the banks of the Mississippi. Slavery is over, but laboring in the fields all day doesn't make her feel very free. Thankfully, Sugar has a knack for finding her own fun, especially when she joins forces with forbidden friend Billy, the white plantation owner's son. Sugar has always yearned to learn more about the world, and she sees her chance when Chinese workers are brought in to help harvest the cane. The older River Road folks feel threatened, but Sugar is fascinated. As she befriends young Beau and elder Master Liu, they introduce her to the traditions of their culture, and she, in turn, shares the ways of plantation life. Sugar soon realizes that she must be the one to bridge the cultural gap and bring the community together. Here is a story of unlikely friendships and how they can change our lives forever.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B008TUQYM6/?tag=2022091-20
2013
(New Orleans in the mid-nineteenth century is a city overf...)
New Orleans in the mid-nineteenth century is a city overflowing with white aristos, black creoles, and African Slaves, a city that pulses with crowds, with commerce and with the power and spectacle of the voodoo religion. At the center of the ritual is Marie Laveau, the notorious voodoiene, worshipped and feared by blacks and whites alike. Marie's followers claimed that she walked on water and sucked poison from a snake's jowls, that she raised the dead and murdered two men. Voodoo Dreams is the spellbinding story of the woman behind the legend. Raised by her Grandmère in the Louisiana bayou, Marie ventures to New Orleans and begins a journey of self-discovery, hoping to find her lost Maman and understand the visions that haunt her dreams. Instead, she runs headlong into the brutality of slavery and oppression and into the arms of John, the voodoo doctor who promises to teach her what Grandmère will not. As she falls under his spell, John sweeps Marie into a world of voodoo ceremonies, of drama and manipulation, and of sometimes terrifying power. A mesmerizing combination of history and story telling, Voodoo Dreams was Jewell Parker Rhodes first novel and a B&N Discover Great New Writers selection.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00C9JJO20/?tag=2022091-20
2013
(It's city-girl Maddy's first summer in the bayou, and she...)
It's city-girl Maddy's first summer in the bayou, and she just falls in love with her new surroundings - the glimmering fireflies, the glorious landscape, and something else, deep within the water, that only she can see. Could it be a mermaid? As her grandmother shares wisdom about sayings and signs, Maddy realizes she may be the only sibling to carry on her family's magical legacy. And when a disastrous oil leak threatens the bayou, she knows she may also be the only one who can help. Does she have what it takes to be a hero? Jewell Parker Rhodes weaves a rich tale celebrating the magic within.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00NERQRZI/?tag=2022091-20
2015
(When her fifth-grade teacher hints that a series of lesso...)
When her fifth-grade teacher hints that a series of lessons about home and community will culminate with one big answer about two tall towers once visible outside their classroom window, Dèja can't help but feel confused. She sets off on a journey of discovery, with new friends Ben and Sabeen by her side. But just as she gets closer to answering big questions about who she is, what America means, and how communities can grow (and heal), she uncovers new questions, too. Like, why does Pop get so angry when she brings up anything about the towers? Award-winning author Jewell Parker Rhodes tells a powerful story about young people who weren't alive to witness this defining moment in history, but begin to realize how much it colors their every day.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B017RQP32E/?tag=2022091-20
2016
(Mira longs to return to the bayou, to sit on her grandma'...)
Mira longs to return to the bayou, to sit on her grandma's lap again and watch the fireflies dance through the air. But she ran off with Charlie, and now she's trapped in a high rise apartment with a wailing baby who shares his name. Can she resist becoming a prisoner in her own home, her own marriage, and her own life? Coretta Scott King honor author Jewell Parker Rhodes tells a brief but unforgettable story of heritage, family, and resistance in Bayou Teché.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01MXFSL3T/?tag=2022091-20
2016
(A heartbreaking and powerful story about a black boy kill...)
A heartbreaking and powerful story about a black boy killed by a police officer, drawing connections through history, from award-winning author Jewell Parker Rhodes.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B074M6GB8Y/?tag=2022091-20
2018
Jewell Parker Rhodes was born in 1954, in Manchester.
Rhodes earned a Bachelor of Arts in Drama Criticism, a Master of Arts in English, and a Doctor of Arts in English (Creative Writing) from Carnegie Mellon University.
Jewell began college as a dance major, but when she discovered there were novels by African Americans, for African Americans, she knew she wanted to be an author. She wrote six novels for adults, two writing guides, and a memoir, but writing for children remained her dream.
Now Jewell has published four children’s books: Ninth Ward, Sugar, Bayou Magic, and Towers Falling. Her fifth, Ghost Boys, will be released in spring of 2018. She's also published six adult novels, two writing guides, and a memoir. When she’s not writing, she’s visiting schools to talk about her books with the kids who read them, or teaching writing at Arizona State University, where she is the Piper Endowed Chair and Founding Artistic Director of the Virginia G. Piper Center for Creative Writing.
(Jewell Parker Rhodes follows up her acclaimed Voodoo Drea...)
2006(Jewell Parker Rhodes, who has earned legions of fans with...)
2005(The critically acclaimed author of Voodoo Dreams delivers...)
2010(When her fifth-grade teacher hints that a series of lesso...)
2016(New Orleans in the mid-nineteenth century is a city overf...)
2013(It's city-girl Maddy's first summer in the bayou, and she...)
2015(A Bird by Bird for the African-American market--A top-not...)
2010(Award-winning author of fiction and nonfiction Jewell Par...)
2010(A heartbreaking and powerful story about a black boy kill...)
2018(In college and graduate school, Jewell Parker Rhodes neve...)
2002(Mira longs to return to the bayou, to sit on her grandma'...)
2016(Ten-year-old Sugar lives on the River Road sugar plantati...)
2013(Twelve-year-old Lanesha lives in a tight-knit community i...)
2010(Jewell Parker Rhodes’s favorite childhood memory - a neig...)
2016(A jazzman, a wharf worker, a prostitute, all murdered. Wr...)
2008(Tulsa, Oklahoma, 1921. A white woman and a black man are ...)
2011(Dr. Marie Levant aka Leveau, great-great granddaughter of...)
2011
Quotations:
“The world can be a hard place sometimes... You have to have heart. You have to be strong. Parents want their children to grow up to be strong. Not just any strong, mind you, but loving strong.”
“Women hand sight down through the generations. Mother to daughter.”