Biography of Joan Bauer

Joan Bauer is an author that writes books for the young adult age group. Her writing takes a humorous approach as she touches on subjects that are relevant to teens. Joan's books have been quite successful, and she has earned numerous awards for them.

Joan Bauer was born in River Forest Illinois on July 12, 1951. As Joan grew up, she always loved comedy and anything that would make people laugh. Joan credits her grandmother for encouraging her sense of being creative. Joan liked to journal as she grew up and became older. She enjoyed writing little stories and also poems. Along with her journaling, Joan loved books a lot, and she made a lot of trips to her local library. She took an interest in a variety of topics all the time.

When Joan was eight years old, her parents became divorced. The divorce really affected Joan terribly, and she felt depressed by the whole situation. Joan's dad had a bad drinking habit, and the effects of this have stayed with her for years, and it shows up in her writings. In one of her first books, "Rules of the Road," Joan addresses the difficult issue of alcoholism in a family. Joan is actually addressing her own pain through the character Jenna Boller.

As Joan became an adult, and was in her twenties, she had an job in advertising. She also worked in sales. This job was with the Chicago Tribune, WLS Radio, Parade Magazine, and McGraw-Hill. It was during this time in her life that Joan met her future husband, Evan. Evan worked as a computer scientist. They dated only for a very short time before they became married in August of 1981. Once Joan was married, her husband encouraged and supported her in her writing efforts. Joan wanted to get recognized right off the bat, but things didn't happen that way for her. She mainly wrote some magazine and newspaper articles, hardly earning any kind of money for these. Her writing efforts were interrupted when she had her first child.

Joan's very first novel was Squashed, published in 1992. This was her first novel she had written after she experienced a terrible car accident from which it took her many months to finally recover from. After Squashed, the novel Thwonk was published in 1995. Joan's daughter Jean, is quite a history expert and getting her PhD in American History. Jean is also married to an intellectual that is a physicist and a theologian as well.