Sandra Fenichel Asher was born October 16, 1942, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to Dr. Benjamin and Fanny Weiner Fenichel. She attended the University of Pennsylvania and Indiana University, where she earned a bachelor's degree in English in 1964. A year's graduate study at the University of Connecticut and an elementary education teaching certificate from Drury College in Springfield, Missouri, completed her formal education.

Asher combined her love for the theater and writing as early as second grade, when she wrote and starred in plays that toured from classroom to classroom. Since then, she has honed her skills and published numerous award-winning plays that have been produced across the country. She is also a poet, having published some seventy poems, and has contributed stories and articles to several national magazines for children and for adults.

Writing for young adults is a responsibility that Asher takes very seriously.

Because teen-agers...