Barbara Delinsky Biography
Barbara Delinsky was born and raised in suburban Boston. "My
mother's death, when I was eight, was the defining event of a
childhood that was otherwise ordinary. I took piano lessons and
flute lessons. I took ballroom dancing lessons. I went to summer
camp through my fifteenth year, then spent my sixteenth summer
learning to drive." After graduating from Newton High School, she
earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Psychology at Tufts University
and a Master of Arts degree in Sociology at Boston College. "I wish
I could say that I had a career in mind, but women were barely
thinking about careers back then. The motivation behind my M.A. was
to get a better job with better pay. My husband was just starting
law school. We needed the money."
She never dreamed of having a
writing career. "I had a vivid imagination, but it was a private
one. As a child, for example, I concocted many a complex scenario to
explain my mother's death and imminent resurrection. But I came from
a family of lawyers, teachers, and homemakers. Although I knew that
I could write well, it never occurred to me to use that skill
professionally."
Following graduate school, she worked as a researcher with the
Massachusetts Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, and
as a photographer and reporter for the Belmont Herald. "I did the
newspaper work after my first son was born. Since I was heavily into
taking pictures of him, I worked for the paper to support that
habit. Initially, I wrote only in a secondary capacity, to provide
copy for the pictures I took. In time, I realized that I was better
at writing than photography." She used both skills doing volunteer
work for hospital groups, and has served on the Board of Directors
of the Friends of the Massachusetts General Hospital Cancer Center
and on the MGH's Women's Cancer Advisory Board.
Ms. Delinsky became a writer by fluke. Her twins were four when,
by chance, she happened on a newspaper article profiling three
female writers. Intrigued, she spent three months researching,
plotting, and writing her own book -- and it sold.
A master of emotional intensity, she touches the minds and hearts
of her readers with intricately woven stories of domestic drama and
relationships. "Readers identify with my characters. They know them.
They are them. I am an everyday woman writing about everyday people
facing not-so-everyday challenges."
Her more than 65 books to date are highly emotional,
character-driven studies of marriage, parenthood, sibling rivalry,
and friendship. They regularly appear on the New York Times, Wall
Street Journal, Washington Post, Publishers Weekly, and USA Today
Bestseller Lists. She lives in New England.
This biography was last updated on 10/22/2008.
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