Kwame Alexander Books In Order

Publication Order of The Crossover Books

Publication Order of The Door of No Return Books

Publication Order of Standalone Novels

Publication Order of Picture Books

Publication Order of Collections

Publication Order of Children's Books

Publication Order of Non-Fiction Books

Publication Order of Anthologies

Kwame Alexander is young adult fiction and children’s fiction author and poet who made his name advocating for introducing the art of writing and literary works to school going children. He made his debut writing the Newbery Medal award-winning novel The Crossover in 2014.

The author was born in New York, but spent much of his childhood and teenage years in Chesapeake, Virginia. It was a childhood full of books as his mother was an educator and his father a book publisher and scholar of quite some renown.

He did his premedical studies at Virginia Tech and then studied writing under Nikki Giovanni, the award-winning poet. His earliest exploits in literature was when he produced the 1994 published “The Flow” as an editor.

He would also become the president and founder of “BlackWords Press,” which operated between 1995 and 2005. He launched the Versify Imprint working with Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, under which he published several children’s fiction.

For several years, he was the producer of an annual book festival targeted at a wide range of readers and writers. As a lover of poetry, he also lived for a time in Virginia, where he was poet in residence at several schools.

Alexander Kwame is best known as an educator, poet, and New York Times bestselling author of more than twenty novels including the Newbery winning John Newbery Medal.

He won the latter for a distinguished contribution to children’s literature. He also won sevenral other awards that included the Passaic Poetry Prize, the King Author Coretta Scott Award, the Lee Bennett Hopkins Award, and the NCTE Charlotte Huck Award.

Even though he is better known as a children’s fiction author, he has asserted that he writes for children of all ages as evidenced by the young adult novel “He Said She Said” and the middle grade novel “Booked.”

According to Kwame, poetry is a potent force for changing the world. As such, he makes use of the genre to empower and inspire children and young people through his Scholastic released “Page to Stage Publishing and Writing Program.”

Kwame is also a regular speaker at conferences and colleges across the United States, even as he travels across the globe spreading literary love in the likes of Shanghai, Singapore, France and Brazil.

He recently led a delegation of 20 activists and writers to Ghana, where they built a library, delivered books and taught literature to more than 300 teachers.

Over the years, he has also been involved in the writing of works that explain the technical aspects of authorship. Some of these include the 2018 published “In The Write Thing,” and the 2002 published “Do the Write Thing.”

Apart from his writing, he has also been involved in community based activities such as a non profit educational literacy service known as “Book in a Day.” The organization was founded to promote the writing and reading skills of children by encouraging them to write and publish poetry.

Given how much work he has done, “The Charleston City Paper” named him a phenomenon in the poetry world. He has also written scripts for the stage and television, and been the producer of several book festivals such as “The Washington Post” presented the “Capital BookFest.”

A collection of his correspondence, personal and professional documents and his writings known as the “Kwame Alexander Papers” are displayed at the Gelman Library at the George Washington University.

In “The Crossover,” the bestselling novel by Kwame Alexander, the author combines beautiful poetry with lyrical prose to tell the story of Josh and Jordan Bell who are thirteen year old basketball players. He makes use of basketball as a representation of life, as he imparts life lessons to middle grade learners in a non threatening way.

Jordan and Josh Bell are phenomenal sons of Chuck Bell, who had been a superstar player and Crystal Bell a junior high school principal. Josh is better in his studies and has aspirations of attending Duke, while Jordan wishes to follow in the footsteps of Michael Jordan and go to North Carolina to become a shooting guard.

Alexander Kwame tells of their exploits off and on the court through onomatopoeic poetry, which portrays basketball as an art form. In addition to playing basketball, the teenagers also experience teenage angst, as Alexis who becomes JB’s new girlfriend causes a huge rift between the brothers.

Nonetheless, their parents impart some vital life lessons that Kwame impairs to the reader through vocabulary words and basketball lessons. The author writes an entertaining story for middle grade learners, as he evokes past and current basketball stars, even as he managed to make for an entertaining story.

Kwame Alexander’s novel “Booked,” follows on from the heels of his debut, as he once again tells a poetic sports tale in the backdrop of teenage angst.
The lead in this work is a soccer player and gifted student Nick Hall who is dealing with the recent divorce of his parents. Nicholas Hall is introduced as a thirteen year old phenomenon in the classroom and soccer field.

Together with Coby, his best friend, he navigates a range of eight grade issues from asking a cute girl to homecoming to bullying.

In the meantime, his parents are getting a divorce as they had let their marriage rot by spending too much time at work. The situation at home is getting to Nick and Alexander explores these issues in the usual lyrical prose and onomatopoeic poetry.

The exchanges between the parents and the teenagers are in the form of asides and rap, instead of traditional dialogue, which makes it a lot of fun. Unlike in Crossover, sports takes a backseat in this work as Nick has many other facets to his life.

“Rebound,” by Kwame Alexander is a novel set in 1988, where Chuck Bell is an OK student in high school.

He was looking forward to having a good time hiking the national parks with his father when a brain hemorrhage killed him. The tragedy hits him hard and his interest in basketball and school suffers.

The only thing he can do is read comic books. He was looking forward to reading comic books in the summer when his mother says that he will be sent to his grandfather’s place for the holidays.

Percy, his grandfather and Alice, his grandmother, are wholesome characters that help him get his head straight. It is a family that has been playing basketball for generations and Alex gets to meetin Roxie, his cousin who is a phenomenon in his own right.

Full of pop culture references, poetry and empathetic characters it is an easy and fun read for young adult readers.