Mount St. Ursula teacher
publishes two novels in a month
BY JASON COHEN
Amidst educating students
on a daily basis and taking
care of her family, one Bronx
teacher still had the time to
have two books published.
In December, Jessica Sticklor,
who teaches AP English at
the Academy of Mount St. Ursula,
330 Bedford Park Boulevard,
had a young adult fantasy
novel, ‘Into the Fairy
Forest’ and a literary novel,
‘The Beekeeper’s Daughter,’
published.
A few years ago she also
won the Bronx Council on the
Arts Chapter One Award.
While she had a book published
in 2012, ‘Betwixt and
Between,’ she told the Bronx
Times, these two books made
her know the juice was worth
the squeeze.
“You really work hard at
it,” she stressed. “It’s a lot of
rejection. You have to be okay
with people saying ‘no’.”
‘Into the Fairy Forest’ deals
with Lorelei Bauer, a modernday
woman with a penchant
for Sylvia Plath, the icon who
struggled with the injustices
against women in the fi fties,
her role and status as a poet,
her job as a mother, and her
mental illness.
‘The Beekeeper’s Daughter’
is about Pippa is a typical
teenager, if you don’t consider
her inability to operate a
cell phone. But then a-typical
things start to happen.
Sticklor, 37, who grew up
in Chicago, and now lives in
Washington Heights, fell in
love with writing at a young
age. She recalled how she
wanted to move to the Big Apple
after watching ‘The Muppets
Take Manhattan’ as a
child.
In fourth grade she entered
a writing contest in school and
was instantly hooked.
“All the kids in school were
like she’s going to be a writer,”
she recalled.
Sticklor made the move
to the big city when she attended
the New School in the
Village. While studying writing,
she realized she also had
a thirst to educate and give
back. She holds a BA English
literature in social research
from The New School and
an MFA in Creative Writing
from CUNY.
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She taught fi ve years at a
school in Queens and for the
previous fi ve has been in Bedford
Park.
“I really found it (teaching)
to be a very rewarding profession,”
she said.
According to Sticklor, writing
is easy, while publishing is
challenging. In fact, after she
wrote ‘Into the Fairy Forest,’
in 2014 and it was never picked
up, she fi gured it was never going
to happen.
“I sent it to agencies and
publishers and it didn’t really
hit,” she said. “I really wasn’t
counting on it getting published
and I had moved on.”
Then much to her surprise,
her two books were suddenly
given the go ahead at the same
time. It was an early holiday
gift.
She noted that with her
husband Adam, two kids, Jacqueline
and Addison and students
in school, she would often
wake up early to write for
a couple hours.
Teacher Jessica Sticklor just had two books published.
Photo Courtesy Geoff Cahayom
She looks forward to writing
more as ‘Into the Fairy
Forest,’ is a series and she is
signed on to do three more
books in the next three years.
Sticklor noted her students
are looking forward to reading
the books.
“It’s been a whirlwind,” she
said. “It’s been great. Seeing
their teacher in print makes
them proud.”
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