Bustard, Anne 1951-

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Bustard, Anne 1951-

Personal

Born 1951, in HI. Education: Attended University of Hawaii, Manoa; University of Texas at Austin, B.A.; earned Ph.D.

Addresses

Home—Austin, TX. Agent—c/o Author Mail, Simon & Schuster, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020. E-mail—[email protected].

Career

Author and educator. Elementary school teacher in TX; Toad Hall Children's Bookstore, Austin, TX, co-owner; University of Texas at Austin, instructor in College of Education.

Member

International Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators, Author's Guild, Writers' League of Texas, Austin Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators.

Awards, Honors

Texas Excellence in Teaching award; Lucile Michaels Pannell Award, for summer writing program; June Franklin Naylor Award, and Teddy Children's Book Award finalist, both 2005, and Triple Crown National Award nominee, 2006, all for Buddy: The Story of Buddy Holly.

Writings

T Is for Texas, Voyager Press (Stillwater, MN), 1989.

Buddy: The Story of Buddy Holly, illustrated by Kurt Cyrus, Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers (New York, NY), 2005.

Contributor to Mailbox magazine; author of blog, Anneographies.

Sidelights

Several years after moving to Texas, Anne Bustard transformed her dream of writing children's books into a reality with the publication of Buddy: The Story of Buddy Holly, a chronicle of the life of a famous rockabilly musician. Moving to Texas to finish college, Bustard worked as a teacher for several years after graduation, then co-founded a book store in Austin. Inspired by the picture-book biographies she stocked on her own store's shelves, as well as by memories of a trip to Holly's home town of Lubbock, Texas, she started to formulate her story, which was published in 2005. In addition to writing for children, Bustard teaches at the University of Texas at Austin and has been recognized in her community for creating an innovative summer writing program for children.

In Buddy Bustard introduces young readers to the Texas-born Holly's ordinary childhood, depicts his evolution as a young musician, and follows his rise to stardom as one of the pioneers of rock-and-roll music. Her detailed author's note adds an in-depth account of the musician's later life as well as his tragic death in a plane crash in 1959 at age twenty-two. Jeffrey A. French, reviewing Buddy for School Library Journal, called the picture-book biography "well done," while a Publishers Weekly critic commented that "those already familiar with the rock-and-roll crooner will better appreciate this lengthy tale and its quirky phrasings." Ilene Cooper, writing in Booklist, noted that the author presents "a raucous, upbeat homage, which uses the cadence and rhythms of the South to capture the feeling of the music and the excitement it generated in Holly."

In an online interview with Cynthia Leitich Smith for Cynsations, Bustard discussed her inspiration to write Buddy. "I'd always loved Buddy Holly's music, but I knew little about his life," she explained. Then, while on a trip to Lubbock on business, "I cruised by the Hi- D-Ho Drive Inn, where Buddy Holly and his friends once sang on the roof. I visited his high school campus where he performed in the choir, drove through streets he'd played on, and I walked along a bank where he might have gone fishing.… Buddy Holly was my inspiration. His music. His life.… Holly dreamed big. And never gave up."