Suzanne Fisher Staples

Suzanne Fisher Staples was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and grew up in a small community beside a lake in North-eastern Pennsylvania. She graduated from Lakeland High School in Scott Township, Pennsylvania, and attended Keystone College in La Plume, Pennsylvania, and graduated from Cedar Crest College in Allentown, Pennsylvania. She worked as a news reporter and editor for United Press International for ten years in Hong Kong, India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, Sri Lanka, New York, and Washington, DC. She later worked as a part time foreign news editor for The Washington Post. She returned to Pakistan in 1985 to assess the lives of poor rural women on an assignment with the United States Agency for International Development. Her books include, “Under the Persimmon Tree”, “Under the Same Stars” and “Shabanu: Daughter of the Wind”, a 1990 Newbery Honor Book.