After retiring from 22 years of public school teaching, JoAn W. Martin continues to serve in a teaching capacity as a reading/writing consultant for Houston area schools. She taught several years in the Alpha program of Gifted and Talented fourth and fifth graders at the University of Houston at Clear Lake. She also served as an adjunct instructor in the School of Education at UH/CL, teaching an undergraduate class, "Language Arts in the Elementary School."

JoAn grew up in Atmore, South Alabama. Much of her writing reflects her childhood after World War II. Her first love is writing children's stories. Her work has appeared in the Houston Chronicle. In addition, she has published more than 30 articles in such magazines as Stable Kids, Travelocity, Byline Magazine and educational magazines such as Learning, The Mailbox and Oasis-Good Apple. She believes reading can change lives and writes to give children books that deal honestly with the issues kids face today, stories that show children how they can understand themselves and others.

As the South Texas Byline representative, she attends writing conferences to promote Byline Magazine. Her volunteer work includes Literacy Volunteers of America at the public library. She enjoys working in her greenhouse and yard to escape the intensity of writing.

JoAn Martin has written several children's novels, but Yankee Girl, a young adult historical novel, is her first book publication. With the assistance of sixth grade teachers, she compiled Read and Write with Yankee Girl, materials to teach the reading objectives of TEKS. She is in the process of marketing Yankee Girl and submitting two other novels to publishers.

Email JoAn at joanwmartin@joanwmartin.com