Scott Simon Books In Order

Publication Order of Standalone Novels

Publication Order of Non-Fiction Books

Publication Order of Anthologies

About Scott Simon
The American author Scott Simon is well known for largely focusing on the memoir genre of novel, with a multitude of awards backing up his work. Featured in a number of different prestigious publications, both online and off, he’s a well established writer with a lot to say. Working in broadcasting as well as in the literary world, he’s gained a voice speaking to large audiences the world over. Understanding what it takes to engage a certain audience as well, he really understands what they’re looking for with his work.

Taking real-life stories and making them engaging and compelling, he understands what it is that hooks readers with his writing. Building an audience through his many listeners, he’s crafted a unique approach, creating and establishing a style that is very much his own. This has developed over time, allowing him to become the all important writer that he currently is today, saying exactly what it is that he wants to say. Informing his many readers as well as entertaining them, he delivers his material in an interesting manner too, providing a lot of insight and knowledge.

Getting to the heart of his stories, he fully understands the characters that drive them too, getting a feel for what really motivates them as people. This has seen him become hugely influential over time, with not just readers, but critics singing his many praises as well. With his witty and humorous looks at people and events, he casts his own unique perspective upon them in the process. Not stopping anytime soon either, he will carry on as a writer into the foreseeable future, with a lot more to follow in the years to come.

Early and Personal Life
Born in 1952 on the 16th of March, Scott Simon was always interested in storytelling, looking at refining and honing it as a craft himself. Developing this over the years, he’d also become highly invested in history, coming to understand the many interesting stories to be told. Starting out as a reporter, he would would report from all across the world, bringing news and politics to a huge audience in real-time.

Chronicling a whole range of different characters, he’d cast his eye across a diverse range of different subjects and people. With awards in journalism, he’d become a regular contributor to networks such as CBS and PBS, having reported from places like Afghanistan and Iraq. Coming from Chicago, he continues to write, living with his wife Caroline Richard, along with their daughters, as he’s got plenty more books for the future.

Writing Career
Bringing out his first fictional novel in 2005, Scott Simon would publish the novel ‘Pretty Birds,’ which would be the first stand-alone title. Soon following this up with ‘Windy City’ in 2008, and then ‘Sunnyside Plaza’ in 2020, all of his fictional books would be entirely self-contained. Some of these books would be based upon historical events, while others would be directed more towards younger readers.

In the past Scott Simon would make a name for himself reporting, as well as being a regular fixture on NPR with his own show, the ‘Weekend Sunday Edition.’ This would allow him to find his own different approach to the genre when it came to writing, looking it at through a somewhat different lens. Winning awards, such as the Peabody and an Emmy for his reporting, he is a gifted writer, as his career grows from strength-to-strength.

Pretty Birds
Initially brought out through the ‘Random House Trade Paperbacks’ publishing label, this would first come out on the 1st of January in 2005. Working entirely as a stand-alone title, it would be a historical novel set during the early 1990s, looking at the events that took place then. It would also be the first fictional book to come from Scott Simon as an author, establishing him as a writer of fiction.

Looking at a period in history, this book manages to cast a light on Sarajevo, and the ethnic cleansing that was attempted there. It doesn’t hold back either, never shying away from the more brutal details of what actually happened during this time. Capturing the many people that inhabited the city upon the page, it creates a whole world that can really be explored by the reader.

Set in the city of Sarajevo in the early 1990s, this sees Irena Zaric living there in the Spring of 1992, as she starts out a star of her high-school basketball team. With her parrot, ‘Pretty Bird’, doing imitations of balls hitting hoops, Irena enjoys life as a normal teenager, that is until the city is hit by war. Now dealing with bullets flying overhead, she must fight to survive in this new battleground, soon finding a new vocation as a sniper. How will she deal with this new way of life? Can she survive through it all? What will become of her parrot and all the other pretty birds?

Sunnyside Plaza
First published through the ‘Little, Brown Books for Young Readers’, this would originally come out on the 21st of January in 2020. It’s a stand-alone murder mystery with its own entirely self-contained story, not being a part of any overall series as such. The story features adults with learning disabilities, and it’s one told with sensitivity, providing a very real sense of empathy throughout. A compassionate book with a lot of heart, it’s an engaging story that really manages to make the most of its subject matter.

Working in the kitchen based in Sunnyside Plaza, Sally Miyake is happy to help there as part of the community center she lives in. Not being able to read, Sally is one of many adults with developmental disabilities there, and it is here that a series of suspicious deaths begin to occur. Taking the investigation into their own hands when no-one else will listen, Sally and the other residents begin to look into what’s happening themselves. Will they be able to discover the truth of what’s really going on? Can they stop the killer from striking again? What is really happening at Sunnyside Plaza?