Watt Key

Albert Watkins Key, Jr., publishing under the name Watt Key, is an American fiction author. A resident of Alabama, his debut novel Alabama Moon was published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux in 2006 and was the 2007 winner of the E.B. White Read-Aloud Award for older readers. It received a 2006 Parents' Choice Award. Alabama Moon has been translated and published in eight languages as of 2012. In 2015 Alabama Moon was listed by TIME Magazine as one of the top 100 young-adult books of all time.

Alabama Moon was made into a 2009 feature film starring John Goodman.

Watt Key is a graduate of Bayside Academy in Daphne, Alabama and received his Bachelor of Arts degree from Birmingham-Southern College in Birmingham, Alabama. He subsequently earned his Masters of Business Administration from Spring Hill College in Mobile, AL. While working as a computer programmer, he began submitting novels to major publishers in New York City. When he was 34 years he sold his debut novel, Alabama Moon, to publisher Farrar, Straus and Giroux. Watt currently lives with his wife and three children in Mobile, Alabama.

• American Library Association Best Books for Young Adults for Alabama Moon
• ABC E.B. White Read Aloud Award, 2007 for Alabama Moon
• SIBA Young Adult Book Award, 2007 for Alabama Moon
• ALLA Young Adult Book Award for Alabama Moon, Dirt Road Home
• Bank Street Best Children's Book of the Year 2013 for Fourmile
• Parents' Choice Award Winner for Alabama Moon
• California Young Reader Medal for Alabama Moon
• Illinois Rebecca Caudill Young Readers Choice Award Master List for Alabama Moon
• Indiana Young Hoosier Award Master List for Alabama Moon, andFourmile
• The Cybils Awards Master List for Dirt Road Home
• Maine Student Book Award Master List for Alabama Moon and Fourmile
• Missouri Truman Readers Award Master List for Alabama Moon
• 2014-2015 MASL Readers Awards Preliminary Nominees for Fourmile
• Vermont Dorothy Canfield Fisher Award Master List for Fourmile
• South Carolina Children's Book Award Master List 2014 for Fourmile
• Kirkus Best Teen Books of the Year 2012 for Fourmile
• Massachusetts Children’s Book Award Master List for 2011 for Alabama Moon
• Volunteer State Book Award Nominees for Alabama Moon
• The Mobile Bay Art & Music Awards (MODDYs) Master list for Fourmile in 2012
• Wildcat Book Award Nominees 2008-2009 for Alabama Moon
• Alabama Moon- Librarian's choice of Auckland Council
• James Medison University Book Award List: Best Books For Young Adults for Alabama Moon
• 2014-2015 Indian Paintbrush Nominee Titles for Fourmile

Novels

• Alabama Moon, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2006
• Dirt Road Home, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2010
• Fourmile, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2012
• Among the Swamp People, The University of Alabama Press, 2015
• Terror at Bottle Creek, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2016
• Hideout, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2017
• Deep Water, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2018

Memoir, essays

• Swamp Writer series, Mobile Bay Magazine, August 2012 - June 2014
• Bay Boy series, Mobile Bay Magazine, July 2014

Screenplays

• Alabama Moon, Faulkner-McLean Productions, 2009
• L.A. Dirt, Tundra Films, 2014