| Dandi Daley Mackall
won her first writing contest as a 10-year-old tomboy. Her 50 words on
“Why I Want to Be Batboy for the Kansas City A’s” won first place, but
the team wouldn’t let a girl be batboy. It was her first taste of
rejection. Since then, Dandi has become an award-winning author of
about 400 books for children and grown-ups, with sales of 4 million in
22 countries. She writes for every age group, believing that her
responsibility is to write out what God writes into her. Sometimes that
message is more “overt” than other times, but the same heart writes each
book, resulting in work that is acclaimed in both BEA and CBA. However,
Dandi feels most at home in CBA, where she can freely declare God’s love
through Jesus Christ. She’s taught writing at Central Oklahoma
University, Bethany University, and Ashland University in Ohio. She was
an instructor with the Institute of Children’s Literature. She was a
missionary behind the Iron Curtain, living on the border of Poland and
Czechoslovakia. Her articles can be found in a variety of magazines,
including Today’s Woman, Chicken Soup for the Kid’s Soul, Family
Circle, Today’s Christian Woman, Western Horseman, Moody Monthly,
Christianity Today, Parenting, Marriage Partnership, Worldwide
Challenge, Guidepost, Power for Living, Brio, and others. She’s
held a humorist column and served as a freelance editor. She’s a
frequent guest on radio talk shows, has hosted over 200 radio phone-in
programs, and made dozens of appearances on TV, including ABC, NBC, and
CBS. Dandi conducts writing assemblies and workshops across the U.S. and
keynotes at conferences and Young Author events. She writes from rural
Ohio with husband, Joe, children, Katy, Jen, and Dan, and a host of
dogs, cats, and horses. And she considers herself blessed for having the
best job in the world!
|