S. E. Hinton

S. E. Hinton, full birth name Susan Eloise Hinton (born July 22, 1948), is an American writer born in Tulsa, Oklahoma who is one of the most popular and best known writers of Young Adult and Children's Literature, the former genre of which she is credited with pioneering. She is married to David Inhofe, a software engineer who she met in freshman biology class at college.

She is best known for The Outsiders, a novel set in Oklahoma in the 1960s that was written during her high school years and published in 1967. The book was inspired by two rival social groups at Will Rogers High School and her desire to empathize with the lower-class Greasers by writing from their point of view, as well as general dissatisfaction with the then-current state of young adult literature.

Hinton's publisher suggested that she use her initials so that the novel would not be immediately dismissed; after its success, Hinton chose to continue writing and publishing using her initials, both to retain what had made her famous and to let her keep her private and public lives separate.

In 1988, Hinton received the inaugural Margaret Edwards Award from the American Library Association for her cumulative contribution in writing for teens, particularly her first four YA novels - which had been published from 1967 to 1979, and adapted as films from 1982 to 1985. In 1992, she was inducted into Phi Beta Kappa by the University of Tulsa; in 1998, she was inducted into the Oklahoma Writers Hall of Fame at the Oklahoma Center for Poets and Writers of Oklahoma State University–Tulsa.

As of September 2005, The Outsiders' had sold more than 14 million copies; according to a division of Penguin Group USA cited in a 2007 article, the book still sold more than 500,000 copies a year at that time.

Hinton has stated in interviews that she is a private, introverted person who no longer does public appearances; however, she does mention that she enjoys reading (Jane Austen, Mary Renault, and F. Scott Fitzgerald), taking classes at the local university, and horseback riding. Hinton also stated in an interview with Vulture that she enjoys writing Fan Fiction.

S. E. Hinton's website can be found here.


 * The Outsiders (1967)
 * That Was Then, This Is Now (novel) (1971)
 * Rumble Fish (1975)
 * Tex (1979)
 * Taming the Star Runner (1988)
 * Big David, Little David (1995), illustrated by Alan Daniel
 * The Puppy Sister (1995), illustrated by Jacqueline Rogers
 * Hawkes Harbor (2004), novel
 * Some of Tim's Stories (2007), short stories


 * Creator Cameo:
 * Hinton plays a nurse in Dallas's hospital room in The Outsiders.
 * In Tex, Hinton plays the role of the typing teacher.
 * Hinton also appears as a prostitute propositioning Rusty James in Rumble Fish.
 * The Film of the Book: Tex, The Outsiders, Rumble Fish and That Was Then... This Is Now. Hinton herself acted as a location scout and made cameo appearances in three of the four films.


 * Great Women Writers (1999), autobiographical account
 * The Legend of Billy Fail (2009), school principal