Jack Gantos' interesting life has provided the raw material for many of his books. The Jack Henry middle-grade fiction series was based on Gantos' own adventures as a boy, and the award-winning Joey Pigza books resulted from Gantos' interactions with children with ADHD. Hole in My Life, a book for teens, tells the true story of the time Gantos spent 18 months in prison.

AdLit.org is a national multimedia project offering information and resources to the parents and educators of struggling adolescent readers and writers. For more interviews with young adult authors, visit us at www.AdLit.org, a national education service of public television station WETA. Funding is provided by grants from Carnegie Corporation of New York and the Ann B. and Thomas L. Friedman Family Foundation.