Cannon uses her keen sense of humor to write novels

It all started with "Cal Cameron by Day, Spider-Man by Night," which won the prestigious Delacorte Prize for Outstanding Young Adult Novel of 1987.

Eleven novels later, Ann Edwards Cannon, sometimes known as A.E. Cannon on book jackets and a Deseret News FamilyLife columnist, is still using her fertile imagination and keen sense of humor to turn out delicious young-adult literature.

During an interview in her Salt Lake home, Cannon said, "There was this feeling that boys wouldn't read a book about boys written by a woman. So, we went with the sex-neutral initials in the manner of S.E. Hinton and M.E. Kerr. It's the ultimate publishing cliche. Whenever you see initials, it's usually a girl trying to pass herself off as a guy."

Although Cannon is no longer convinced initials are needed, her newest book, "The Loser's Guide to Life and Love," is attributed to A.E. Cannon. Think J.K. Rowling. Cannon's book is a contemporary twist on Shakespeare's "A Midsummer Night's Dream" and features Ed, his two best friends, Scout and Quark, plus a girl named Ellie.

Cannon has also written "The Shadow Brothers," "Charlotte's Rose" and "On the Go with Pirate Pete and Pirate Joe." When still a first-grader, Cannon was forced to spend a year in bed recovering from a serious illness. The result was an acceleration of her interest in books and the development of her imagination. The books introduced her "to people who had tea parties on the ceiling and others who went down rabbit holes."

For ideas, Cannon has relied somewhat on her five sons for capturing a boy's voice and for her own experiences for capturing a girl's voice.

The daughter of LaVell Edwards, Brigham Young University's famed football coach, she attended high school in Provo and took two academic degrees in English from BYU. While still a student, she started writing her own young-adult literature and sending it to publishers. The degrees have been useful when she has wanted to teach at BYU and Westminster College in Salt Lake City.

Married to Ken Cannon, an attorney, she was 25 when she had her first child. Immediately, she could see the creative nature of both motherhood and writing. "As a young mother, I could put the kids to bed and then stay up and write 'til 2 a.m. But now I'm just shot after 6 p.m., so I have to do most of my writing in the early mornings."

The parrot and the huge, friendly, long-haired Newfoundland dog keep her company.

Although Cannon's interest has always been young-adult books, she has picked up on a bias held by several people who periodically told her that what she was doing was "good practice for writing real books."

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