Claudia Mills

Claudia Mills is a high-profile intellectual and award-winning author, who has made significant contributions to children's literature. She is a prolific writer, with almost sixty books to her name, and is known for addressing morality and incorporating philosophical elements in her work. Mills was born in New York City in 1954 and received her bachelor's degree from Wellesley College, her master's and Ph.D. in philosophy from Princeton University, and an M.L.S. degree from the University of Maryland, with a concentration in children's literature. She had a second career as a professor of philosophy at the University of Colorado at Boulder, specializing in ethics and political philosophy, before leaving to write full time in 2014.

Mills' bibliography includes standalone books, picture books, poems, and literary series, with her target market being young readers. Some of her notable works include "Nixie Ness, Cooking Star," "7 x 9 = Trouble!," "Zero Tolerance," and "Write This Down." She draws on her childhood memories growing up in New Jersey and her sons' experiences growing up in Colorado for her writing. Mills loves visiting schools, where she looks for material that can be used in her chapter books and middle-grade novels. She has a strict writing schedule, writing for an hour every day between 5 and 7 in the morning while drinking Swiss Miss hot chocolate at her cozy home near the foothills of the Rocky Mountains. In addition to her books for children, she has published many articles on philosophical and ethical themes in children's literature and has edited a collection of essays on the subject.