02/21/2022
June 30, Mrs. Irene Latham, Irene Latham is the winner of the 2016 International Literary Association-Lee Bennett Hopkins Promising Poet Award and the Alabama State Poetry Society 2006 Poet of the Year, Irene has published poems for adults and children in literary journals; children's magazines, including Scholastic's Action, Scope and Storyworks; and anthologies edited by Lee Bennett Hopkins, J. Patrick Lewis, Paul B. Janeczko, Janet Wong, Sylvia Vardell and others. Her three full-length collections for adults have earned awards including the 2007 Alabama State Poetry Society Book of the Year, an Independent Publisher's (IPPY) Award, and the Writer's Digest 19th Annual Self-Published Book Prize for Poetry. She has served as poetry editor for Birmingham Arts Journal since 2003 and especially loves discovering and working with people just finding their poetic voices. Her blog Live Your Poem has been active since 2006 and currently features hundreds of original poems inspired by art.
Irene's poetry books for children include nature titles like Dear Wandering Wildebeest, When the Sun Shines on Africa, and This Poem is a Nest, an innovative book featuring found poetry. Take a trip to the farmer's market with her collection Fresh Delicious and celebrate the number 9 with Nine: A Book of Nonet Poems. Together with Charles Waters, she created I & C Construction Co. (Building Books One Word at a Time sing 2015). Their first collaboration Can I Touch Your Hair? Poems of Race, Mistakes, and Friendship was named a Charlotte Huck Honor book, a Kirkus Best Book of 2018, and an NCTE Notable Poetry Book. Their second title Dictionary for a Better World: Poems, Quotes and Anecdotes from A to Z was released in 2020, and they have several more titles forthcoming.
Irene is also the author of award-winning novels for children: Leaving Gee's Bend (Putnam/Penguin, 2010) and Don't Feed the Boy (Roaring Brook/Macmillan, 2012). Her newest novel D-39, about a girl and her robodog, will be published in 2021. Her most recent releases include three narrative picture books featuring animals: Meet Miss Fancy, historical fiction about a boy and an elephant in 1913 Birmingham, Alabama; Love, Agnes: Postcards from an Octopus, which is Irene's love letter to her patronus the octopus; and The Cat Man of Aleppo (with Karim Shamsi-Basha).
Irene lives on a lake in rural Alabama with her husband Paul, Australian shepherd named Rosie and a senior cat named Maggie, who is Queen of the House. A new cellist, you can often find her practicing in her Purple Horse Poetry Studio and Music Room. She loves exploring new places and often uses "research" as an excuse to travel.
