Margarita Engle

Margarita Engle (born in Pasadena, California on September 2, 1951) is a Cuban American poet and author of many award-winning books for children, young adults and adults. Most of Engle's stories are written in verse and are a reflection of her Cuban heritage and her deep appreciation and knowledge of nature. She became the first Latino awarded a Newbery Honor in 2009 for The Surrender Tree: Poems of Cuba's Struggle for Freedom.

Engle's father was born in Los Angeles, California and her mother in Trinidad, Cuba. Although Engle was born and raised in California, growing up, she spent many summers with her extended family in Cuba. As a child, she was introduced to poetry in Spanish, particularly the works of Jose Martí.

Engle earned a B.S. from California State Polytechnic University in 1974, an M.S. from Iowa State University in 1977, and a doctoral degree in biology from the University of California, Riverside in 1983. Before starting her writing career, Engle was a tenured professor of agronomy at California Polytechnic University. While completing her doctoral degree, she took a seminar in creative writing with Tomás Rivera, and credits this experience with igniting her passion to write. She lives in Central California, where she enjoys helping her husband with his volunteer work for wilderness search and rescue dog training programs.

THE POET SLAVE OF CUBA, A Biography of Juan Francisco Manzano (Henry Holt & Co., 2006)

• 2008 Pura Belpré Medal winner - narrative
• International Reading Association Teachers’ Choice
• ALA Best Books for Young Adults
• NCTE Notable Children’s Books in the Language Arts
• Bank Street

THE SURRENDER TREE, Poems of Cuba’s Struggle for Freedom (Henry Holt & Co., 2008)

• 2009 Newbery Honor
• 2009 Pura Belpré Medal winner - narrative
• Américas Award
• Jane Addams Award
• Claudia Lewis Poetry Award
• Lee Bennett Hopkins Honor
• ALA Best Books for Young Adults
• ALA Notable Book
• NCSS-CBC Notable Social Studies Book
• Amelia Bloomer Book
• Booklist Editors Choice
• Kansas State Reading Circle
• Michigan Great Lakes Great Books Award Master List
• Junior Library Guild Selection

TROPICAL SECRETS, Holocaust Refugees in Cuba (Henry Holt & Co., 2009)

• Sydney Taylor Award
• Paterson Prize
• Américas Award Commendation
• New York Public Library 100 Titles for Reading and Sharing
• ALA Best Books for Young Adults Nominee
• California Teachers Association Recommended Book

THE FIREFLY LETTERS, A Suffragette’s Journey to Cuba (Henry Holt & Co., 2010)

• 2011 Pura Belpré Medal Honor
• Jane Addams Award Finalist
• California Book Award Finalist
• International Reading Association Notable Book for a Global Society
• NCSS-CBC Notable Social Studies Book
• Amelia Bloomer Book
• TAYSHAS Choice
• Junior Library Guild Selection

SUMMER BIRDS, The Butterflies of Maria Merian (Henry Holt & Co., 2010, picture book)

• Kirkus Best Books for Children
• NCSS-CBC Notable Social Studies Book
• Amelia Bloomer Book

HURRICANE DANCERS, The First Caribbean Pirate Shipwreck (Henry Holt & Co., 2011)

• 2012 Pura Belpré Author Honor
• ALSC 2012 Notable Children's Book for older readers
• ALA Best Books for Young Adults nominee
• Poetry for Children Blog's Top 20 Most Distinctive Books of Poetry 2011
• 2012 White Ravens List

DRUM DREAM GIRL, (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt., 2015)

• 2016 Charlotte Zolotov Award

ENCHANTED AIR: TWO CULTURES, TWO WINGS: A MEMOIR (Simon and Schuster., 2015)

• 2016 Pura Belpré Author Award

• ^ admin (1999-11-30). "The Pura Belpré Award winners, 1996-present". Association for Library Service to Children (ALSC). Retrieved 2016-10-25. 

• "Archetype"; "Memory"; "Variations on a Theme", Terrain.org
• Singing to Cuba, Arte Publico Press, 1993, ISBN 978-1-55885-070-5
• Skywriting, Bantam Books, 1995, ISBN 978-0-553-09987-4
• The Poet Slave of Cuba, a Biography of Juan Francisco Manzano (Henry Holt & Co., April, 2006) ISBN 978-0-8050-7706-3
• The Surrender Tree (Holt, 2008) ISBN 978-0-8050-8674-4
• Tropical Secrets: Holocaust Refugees in Cuba, Macmillan, 2009, ISBN 978-0-8050-8936-3
• The Firefly Letters: A Suffragette's Journey to Cuba, Henry Holt & Co., 2010, ISBN 978-0-8050-9082-6
• Summer Birds: The Butterflies of Maria Merian, Henry Holt & Co., 2010, ISBN 978-0-8050-8937-0
• Hurricane Dancers The First Caribbean Pirate Shipwreck, Henry Holt & Co., 2011, ISBN 978-0-8050-9240-0
• The Wild Book, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2012, ISBN 978-0-547-58131-6
• When You Wander, Henry Holt and Co., 2013, ISBN 9780805093124
• The Lightning Dreamer, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 201, ISBN 9780547807430
• Mountain Dog, Henry Holt and Co., 2013, ISBN 978-0805095166
• Orangutanka: A Story in Poems, Henry Holt and Co., 2015, ISBN 978-0-8050-9839-6