Tananarive Due facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Tananarive Due
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Due at the 2023 National Book Festival
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| Born | January 5, 1966 Tallahassee, Florida, U.S. |
| Occupation | Writer, educator |
| Nationality | American |
| Education | Medill School of Journalism (BS, MA) |
| Genre | Science fiction, mystery, horror |
| Spouse | Steven Barnes (husband) |
| Relatives | Jason (son) Nicki (stepdaughter) |
Tananarive Due, born on January 5, 1966, is an American writer and teacher. She has won many awards for her books. These include the American Book Award for The Living Blood and the Bram Stoker Award for Best Novel, Shirley Jackson Award, and World Fantasy Award for The Reformatory. She is also an expert on horror films, especially those made by Black creators. Tananarive Due teaches a special class at UCLA called "The Sunken Place." This class looks at how racism and survival are shown in Black horror movies, like the film Get Out.
Early Life and School
Tananarive Due was born in Tallahassee, Florida. She is the oldest of three daughters. Her mother, Patricia Stephens Due, was a civil rights activist. This means she worked to make sure all people had equal rights. Her father, John D. Due Jr., was a civil rights lawyer. Her mother named her after the capital city of Madagascar, which is called Antananarivo.
Due studied journalism at Northwestern University. She earned a bachelor's degree there. Later, she got a master's degree in English literature from the University of Leeds. She focused on Nigerian literature during her studies.
Her Writing Career
Tananarive Due started as a journalist for the Miami Herald newspaper. Her first novel, The Between, came out in 1995. This book, like many others she wrote, is a supernatural story. This means it includes ghosts or other mysterious things.
She also wrote The Black Rose, a historical novel about Madam C. J. Walker. Madam C. J. Walker was a famous Black businesswoman. Due also wrote Freedom in the Family, which is a nonfiction book. It tells the true story of the civil rights movement.
Tananarive Due has written several book series. These include the African Immortals novels and the Tennyson Hardwick novels.
She teaches creative writing at Antioch University Los Angeles. She also holds a special teaching position at Spelman College in Atlanta.
After the movie Get Out came out in 2017, Due created a class at UCLA. The class is called "The Sunken Place: Racism, Survival and the Black Horror Aesthetic." It explores how Black horror films deal with racism. The class became very popular, and the director of Get Out, Jordan Peele, even visited it.
In 2019, Due was in a documentary film called Horror Noire: A History of Black Horror. Her novel The Reformatory was published in 2023.
Personal Life
Tananarive Due is married to author Steven Barnes. They met in 1997 at a meeting about science fiction and horror. They live in the Los Angeles, California area with their son, Jason.
Awards and Honors
Tananarive Due has received many awards for her writing:
- Nominated for a Bram Stoker Award for her first novel, The Between.
- Nominated for a Bram Stoker Award for My Soul to Keep.
- Received the NAACP Image Award for In the Night of the Heat: A Tennyson Hardwick Novel.
- Won the American Book Award for The Living Blood.
- Won the 2016 British Fantasy Award for her short story collection Ghost Summer.
- Won the 2020 Ignyte Award for her nonfiction work Black Horror Rising.
- Won the 2022 Ember Award for her important contributions to the genre.
- Won the 2023 World Fantasy Award for her short story "Incident at Bear Creek Lodge."
- Won the 2023 Shirley Jackson Award for her novel The Reformatory.
See also
In Spanish: Tananarive Due para niños
- List of horror fiction authors
