Last month the Associates Program of the Boston Public Library in Boston, an independent nonprofit dedicated to conserving the library’s special collections, marked the 20th anniversary of its Writer-in-Residence Program for emerging children’s and YA authors with the announcement of a new incentive. It increased the stipend for its 12-month residency with an office at the main library’s Copley Square location from $23,000 plus $2,000 for coaching and/or editorial assistance to $50,000 plus the $2,000 additional assistance funding.
In a statement to PW, the residency’s anonymous benefactor, or “investor,” as they prefer to be called, said that the significantly increased purse “brings stature and authority to the award, and signals [the high regard] that the Associates and the BPL [have for] literature in general, and children’s literature in particular. Readers today are the future creators of the world of tomorrow.”
The investor also singled out a comment that they made to the Boston Globe in 2015 to explain their ongoing interest in the library and children’s literature. “As a young reader who eagerly awaited the day when I was old enough to have my own library card, I became aware at an early age of the important role a library plays in a child’s life. It was there I discovered Lloyd Alexander’s The Book of Three and Jane Langton’s The Diamond in the Window.”
Staying the Course
In late September, months after Yssis Cano-Santiago had applied for the residency and was notified that she had been selected as this year’s fellowship recipient, she got a call from the Associates Program’s board chair, Alyce Lee, who cochairs the WIR Committee, to let her know that the stipend had been doubled.
But even with additional funds, Cano-Santiago plans to stick to the schedule that enabled her to complete a rough draft of the loosely autobiographical YA novel set in Miami in the 1990s, A Hypochondriac’s Guide to Love, which helped earn her the residency. The book draws on her experiences growing up low-income in a Latinx community and learning that healthcare access is not equitable. Cano-Santiago works full-time at the Boston Public Health Commission as a paralegal and comes to the library to write in the evening and on weekends. The difference, she said, is that now she gets paid. Plus, through the fellowship, she works in her own mahogany-paneled writing room.
For Lee, the increased stipend reflects the confidence the Associates’ board has in the value of the WIR program. “This is essentially a matter of putting our financial resources in service to our commitment and the belief that writers should be able to make a living at their craft,” she noted. And, she added, the residency calls attention to talents that might otherwise have been overlooked.
Overlooked No More
Each year since 2004 when Hannah Barnaby was selected as the very first writer-in-residence for her YA novel-in-progress, Wonder Show, which was subsequently published by Clarion in 2012, most writers who participate in the fellowship have gone on to publish not just the book that drew them to the residency, but others as well. Barnaby has published a dozen kids’ books, including most recently The Pumpkin Seed’s Secret (Sourcebooks), a picture book with illustrations by Cédric Abt. Like all fellowship recipients, the book-length draft of her manuscript, completed during her residency, was donated to the Special Collections department at the BPL.
Altogether more than 80 books by fellowship recipients have been published or accepted for publication since the program began. Among those due out in 2025 are How to Survive the End of the World (Candlewick/MITeen Press), a YA graphic novel by Katy Doughty (2021–22); and Top Heavy (Holiday House), a YA novel written in verse by Rhonda DeChambeau (2022–23). In addition, Knopf recently signed two picture books by Autumn Allen (2020–21): Step on Board: Sculpting a Memorial to Harriet Tubman, illustrated by Ekua Holmes, and Answered Prayers, illustrated by Charly Palmer.
Several books have also been optioned for film or television, including City of Saints and Thieves by Natalie C. Anderson (2014–15), Don’t Ask Me Where I’m From by Jennifer De Leon (2015–16 ), and Rabbit Cake by Annie Hartnett 2013–14).
Beyond YA
The residency program grew out of the Associates’s strategic plan in the early years of the millennium when they defined their mission as “expanding the role of the library in the intellectual life of the city,” according to Alan Andres, who spent three decades in trade publishing and was the first leader of WIR and continues to be a member of the committee. He credited historian Stephen Fox with coming up with the idea of a short-term residency. Although Fox was initially thinking about one for authors of adult titles, the Associates chose to focus on emerging children’s writers. It aligned with their annual event, the Literary Lights Program for Children, which has since been discontinued.
To date, most fellowship recipients have been selected for their YA novel-writing talent. But under Andres’s leadership, the Associates have made a few exceptions. In 2011 WIR deliberately restructured the fellowship that year for writer-illustrators, and Sarah Winnifred Searle was selected for the graphic novel Under the Apple Tree. A decade later in 2021, WIR chose two fellowship recipients, YA novelist Ying-Ju Lai for Going to Disneyland and writer-illustrator Katy Doughty for How to Survive the End of the World.
Going forward, Lee said, “We are committed to the importance of young adult literature as a genre that nurtures what we prize about the written word: a love of ideas and respect for experiences, a fresh way to feel and see the world, and a pathway for imagination and understanding.” But she also anticipates expanding the fellowship to include more work written specifically for younger readers.
