40 Fun Facts About Jason Reynolds

Which rapper's third album moved a nine-year-old Jason Reynolds to start writing poetry every day?

Queen Latifah's Black Reign was the first cassette Reynolds ever bought, and it convinced him that rap was poetry. He says he gave up reading books at about the same age.

Most of Jason Reynolds's novel Long Way Down unfolds during a single ride in what?

An elevator carries 15-year-old Will down from his apartment with a gun in his waistband, and a victim of gun violence from his past steps on at each floor.

Which TV series featured Jason Reynolds discussing his collection of rare books and literary letters?

Antiques Roadshow had him on in 2021 to talk about collecting. His shelves hold an autographed first edition of Toni Morrison's Beloved and a pre-publication copy of Manchild in the Promised Land.

Which bestselling children's author graduated from Bishop McNamara High School 11 years before Jason Reynolds did?

Jeff Kinney, creator of Diary of a Wimpy Kid, is a fellow alumnus of the school. Reynolds graduated in 2000 and went on to earn an English degree.

Where was Jason Reynolds often standing as he drafted his first novel while managing a retail store?

At the cash register of the Rag & Bone store he managed, Reynolds wrote whenever business was slow, after graduate schools had turned him down over his college grades.

Which Marvel hero, a Brooklyn teen on scholarship at an elite prep school, stars in a Jason Reynolds novel?

Miles Morales, the Afro-Puerto Rican Spider-Man, has to survive junior year as well as villains. Reynolds likened his approach to Jordan Peele's film Get Out, boiling big social issues down to one family.

Which author's memoir Black Boy finally hooked Jason Reynolds on reading when he was 17?

Richard Wright won him over because the drama starts by page two instead of after 50 pages of setup. Reynolds found the book while working in a bookstore during college.

In Jason Reynolds's novel Ghost, which snack is the fact-loving title character always buying and eating?

Sunflower seeds are his habit, bought from a neighborhood store and eaten at a bus stop while he watches gym-goers tire themselves out on treadmills, which he finds hilarious.

Jason Reynolds's four-episode Radiotopia podcast explores his bond with which member of his family?

His mother, Isabell, joins him on My Mother Made Me, where talk of birth, death and spirituality sits beside trips to Costco and the casino.

Which institution named Jason Reynolds its National Ambassador for Young People's Literature from 2020 to 2022?

The Library of Congress created the post in 2008, modeled on Britain's Children's Laureate, and gave it first to Jon Scieszka.

Which author co-wrote the two-voiced novel All American Boys with Jason Reynolds after they met on a book tour?

Brendan Kiely wrote the white teenager who witnesses a police beating while Reynolds wrote the victim, a partnership that began when the two shared a room on a 2013 tour.

Jason Reynolds's Stamped is a young readers' 'remix' of a National Book Award winner by which scholar?

Ibram X. Kendi asked Reynolds to rework his 2016 book for teens, and Reynolds first said no because he saw himself strictly as a fiction writer.

Jason Reynolds was born in which city before growing up in the neighboring suburb of Oxon Hill?

Washington, DC was his birthplace, and the family moved just two blocks over the city line to get a yard and enough room to shelter grandparents, aunties and cousins.

Jason Reynolds's Look Both Ways follows a different group of middle schoolers through which part of their day?

The walk home interested Reynolds as a stretch when kids are unsupervised and get to learn about the world on their own, for better or for worse.

Jason Reynolds first performed his poem For Every One at an event for a memorial to which leader?

Martin Luther King Jr. was being honored at the Kennedy Center when Reynolds first performed the poem, an encouragement to young dreamers that was published as a book in 2018.

Which poet is celebrated in Jason Reynolds's first picture book, set at a joyous Harlem library party?

Langston Hughes had an auditorium named for him at the Schomburg Center in 1991, and the book restages its opening-night party with famous writers peering out from the spines of their books.

Which foundation named Jason Reynolds a fellow in 2024 for depicting the rich inner lives of kids of color?

The MacArthur Foundation picked him at age 40 for one of its fellowships, popularly known as genius grants, praising his poet's ear for rhythm.

Jason Reynolds wrote Long Way Down, about a teen weighing revenge for his brother, in which form?

In verse was a homecoming for Reynolds, who had published poetry collections for years before his first novel, and the book went on to be named a Newbery Honor title.

Which 2014 book was Jason Reynolds's first novel, winning him a new-talent award from librarians?

When I Was the Greatest follows 15-year-old Ali and two brothers nicknamed Noodles and Needles after they crash a party in Brooklyn, and it won the John Steptoe prize for new talent.

What is the name of the elite youth track team that Ghost joins in Jason Reynolds's bestselling series?

The Defenders gain a new narrator in each book, and Ghost wins his place by inserting himself into a practice and proving fast enough to impress the hard-as-nails coach.

In All American Boys, which teenager's chapters, narrated after a police beating, did Jason Reynolds write?

Rashad Butler is wrongly suspected of stealing in a convenience store, and Reynolds wrote his side of the story from a hospital bed while his co-author voiced a witness.

A photo of Amiri Baraka dancing with which poet at a 1991 celebration inspired Jason Reynolds's first picture book?

Maya Angelou, in a sparkly top, was caught mid-dance by a New York Times photographer, and Reynolds said the image had intrigued him for years.

At which university did Jason Reynolds earn an English degree despite failing a college English class?

The University of Maryland is where Reynolds scraped through another English course with a D, first heard spoken word, and published a poetry collection as an undergraduate.

All American Boys by Jason Reynolds ranked third on the American Library Association's 2020 list of what?

Most challenged books was a list the novel made over its profanity, drug use and alleged anti-police views, and one North Carolina school answered a complaint by inviting officers into class.

Jason Reynolds says the dead visitors in Long Way Down work like the 'magic' of which classic story?

A Christmas Carol was his comparison: nobody waves a wand, but people from Will's own life come back, and Reynolds leaves open whether they are ghosts or his subconscious.

Which Brooklyn neighborhood, Jason Reynolds's own home for years, is the setting of his first novel?

Bedford-Stuyvesant was his base until 2016, and one review called the debut he set there a tender homage to a seemingly dangerous neighborhood.

One of Jason Reynolds's earliest poems, written at age 10 after his grandmother died, was printed where?

On the funeral program is where it appeared after he wrote a few lines to console a grieving parent, and he went on to write poems as each of his grandmother's siblings passed.

In Jason Reynolds's As Brave as You, what does 11-year-old Genie discover about his grandfather in Virginia?

He is blind, yet stubbornly self-sufficient, and the novel about two Brooklyn brothers sent to the country for a month won Reynolds the Kirkus Prize.

Jason Reynolds's Twenty-Four Seconds from Now, narrated by a nervous teenager named Neon, belongs to which genre?

Romance drives the book, which follows Neon and his girlfriend of two years as he battles a serious case of nerves and leans on his older sister for advice.

What is the real first name of the runner nicknamed Ghost in Jason Reynolds's Track series?

Castle Cranshaw gave himself the nickname, and he feels he has been running ever since the night he and his mom fled his father, who has been in jail for three years.

Which author's novel The Young Landlords gave Jason Reynolds the confidence to write in his own voice?

Walter Dean Myers was the father of Reynolds's friend Christopher, who urged him to read the older books, and an award named for the author later went to All American Boys.

Look Both Ways won Jason Reynolds which British children's book prize, founded in 1936 and judged by librarians?

The Carnegie Medal went to Reynolds in 2021, years after he had been told his stories were too American to be published in the UK.

How did Jason Reynolds get to know Jason Griffin, the artist behind Ain't Burned All the Bright?

As college roommates the two Jasons began collaborating, then moved to New York and self-published a book of poems and art in 2005 that earned them an agent.

In Jason Reynolds's Stuntboy books, what name does young hero Portico give to his bouts of anxiety?

The frets strike Portico as his parents argue, and he copes by secretly acting as a superhero around Skylight Gardens, the massive apartment complex where he lives.

Which author did Jason Reynolds succeed in 2020 as National Ambassador for Young People's Literature?

Jacqueline Woodson held the post for the usual two years before him, while Reynolds stayed on for a third year and served through 2022.

Roughly how much time passes during the main action of Jason Reynolds's Long Way Down, after its opening days?

About a minute is all that passes once the story's main journey begins, a sliver of time that Reynolds stretches across an entire book.

Which field event does dance-loving Sunny Lancaster take up in Jason Reynolds's Track series?

Discus suits Sunny, a homeschooled runner who feels crushed by his father's hopes of raising a marathoner and would rather move like a dancer.

Lu, the hurdler who narrates the fourth Track novel by Jason Reynolds, was born with which condition?

Albinism made Lu a target for bullies, just as a childhood stutter did for his father, and the book has him learning a new event in the week before the championships.

Which mystery writers' award named Jason Reynolds's Long Way Down the best young adult work of its year?

The Edgar Award, named for Edgar Allan Poe, went to the book in 2018, the same season that librarians gave it both Newbery and Printz honors.

Jason Reynolds's Stamped repeatedly insists to its teenage readers that it is not what?

A history book is exactly what it claims not to be, using slang and pop culture references to trace racist ideas from 1415 onward across five sections.