Betsy Byars, who drew from life to write award-winning children’s books that often portrayed young people grappling with abandonment, died on Feb. 26 at her home in Seneca, S.C. She was 91. Her daughter, Nan Byars, said the cause was complications after a fall in November. According to an article in The Christian Science Monitor, Ms. Byars told an audience at the Smithsonian Institution in 1984 that she found many of her characters by “going through life like a pickpocket — I do a lot of creative stealing.” She regularly placed her characters in tense situations, with a pronounced absence of adult support. “Other authors have used the gimmick of getting rid of the parents, but none of them have done it with the zest I have,” Ms. Byars said. “I’ve sent them down turquoise mines, had them running from the F.B.I., and made them into country-western singers.”

Source: New York Times March 15, 2020 18:45 UTC