INTRODUCTION
Paulette Bourgeois was born in Winnipeg, Manitoba Canada on July 20, 1951. She graduated with a Bachelors of Science degree in Occupational Therapy from the University of Western Ontario in 1974. She later went on to pursue a degree in Journalism at Carleton University. Bourgeois started a family and in 1983 Bourgeois was inspired to write children's books after her own kids were born. This was the birth of the famous children's book series Franklin.
Before becoming an author, Paulette pursued her Occupational Therapy degree, and practiced her license for three years before realizing it wasn't what she wanted to do. Before becoming a journalist and her teenage years had many other diverse jobs such as a cashier at Dairy Queen, she worked in a floral store, and was even a waitress at a local restaurant. After working as an Occupational Therapist she became a television reporter for Ottawa Citizen and CBC Television, she then went on and became a freelance journalist in Washington D.C. contributing pieces to Canadian Living, Readers Digest. Bourgeois also graduated with MFA in Creative Writing from the University of British Columbia in 2009.
Bourgeois has two kids, a son named Gordon and daughter named Natalie who were actually her inspiration for becoming a children's book writer. She also has a dog named Dixie Lee Ragtime, who is a Cocker Spaniel. The family enjoys riding bikes, skiing, and Paulette enjoys quilting. Some of her interests include reading, she enjoys big, thick books and her favorite genre is fiction. Her favorite food goes back and forth between Indian and Vietnamese foods. On her spare time she enjoys peace and quiet and quite often quits, skis, and bike rides.
After the birth of her first child, Natalie, she decided to write a children's book. Her story line was inspired by TV series M.A.S.H, where one of the characters is afraid to go into a dark cave inspiring her first book Franklin in the Dark. Bourgeois has written many children's books over the years such as Changes in You and Me, Big Sarah's little Boots and more, but the most famous is her Franklin series. The story of a young turtle who was afraid of dark places including his shell was rejected six times by publishing company's. Kids can Press, was the company that finally published her book along with illustrator Brenda Clark. After moving forward with the children's books and eventually making it a series, Franklin's books came to sell over 60 million copies around the world. The Franklin series became so popular that is was translated into over 38 different languages. Not only that, it became a cartoon on TV as well.
After Franklin was published and later became a series, it spread over the industry. Franklin soon became a Television show, Franklin dolls were being sold, and Franklin movies were being seen on the big screens. Children loved Franklin so much they were going to sleep with him every night. After the Franklin series she then wrote other books such as Big Sarah's Little Boots, Oma's Quilt, Firefighters, The Dirt on Dirt and many other children's books. During an occasion the Canadian Association of Occupational Therapists asked her to write a picture book, You, Me, and my O.T., to explain the many jobs that O.T's do at home, schools, and the community.
Paulette Bourgeois is currently 65 years old residing in Toronto, Ontario with her family. She is now hoping to write more stories for older children and grown ups. she is in the process of writing a book for middle-grade readers, an adult novel and a screenplay. Unfortunately, she is currently not doing any school visits like she once did.