Carol Plum-Ucci


Carol Plum-Ucci is a young adult novelist and essayist. Plum-Ucci's most famous work to date is The Body of Christopher Creed, for which she won a Michael L. Printz Award in 2002 and was named a Finalist to the Edgar Allan Poe Award. Describing her subjects as "the most common, timeless, and most heart-felt teenagers," Plum-Ucci is widely recognized for her use of the South Jersey shore to set scenes for engaging characters embracing suspense themes.

Early life, education, and career

As Plum-Ucci grew up she knew she wanted to write books. The Body of Christopher Creed was her "cloud song."
Plum-Ucci grew up on the barrier island of Brigantine, New Jersey, where she attended the public schools until the age of thirteen. She then went to Atlantic City Friends’ School, where her grandmother, Neva Ingersoll, taught advanced high school mathematics. She graduated from Holy Spirit High School in 1975. Her father, Neil Plum, and her paternal grandmother, Ads Plum, partnered in the funeral business, owning Plum Funeral Homes in Brigantine, Atlantic City, and Ventnor. Plum-Ucci largely attributes her writer's imagination to lying awake at night, above the Brigantine funeral parlor, listening to the sounds downstairs.
She received her bachelor's in communication from Purdue University in 1979. She served as feature editor of the Purdue Exponent, a two-year post. After Purdue, Plum-Ucci was a freelance writer in the Chicago area for several years. She became Assistant to the Producer of the Miss America Pageant in Atlantic City in 1984. She later served as Staff Writer and Director of Publications of the Miss America Organization and Miss America Scholarship Foundation, producing up to a dozen publications a year for volunteers and participants. Plum-Ucci retired in 1999, two months after receiving her first advance on royalties from The Body of Christopher Creed from Harcourt—the first novel she sold.
She has been a resident of Absecon, New Jersey.

Novels