Goodbye, Ruth Chew...

Ruth Chew passed away on May 13, 2010 at the age of 90.

The Washington Post published an obituary on Sunday, May 16.

The San Francisco Chronicle published an obituary on Sunday, June 6.

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The Wednesday Witch

You have reached the official online home of Ruth Chew, the author and illustrator of a number of chapter books, including The Wednesday Witch.

If you love adventure, wonder, and magic; witches, wizards, black cats and pointed hats; flying, shrinking, and time travel; magic coins, buttons, hammers, and glue; history and mystery; broomsticks, bathmats, and vacuum cleaners; brothers, sisters, and friends; mushrooms and potions; birds, squirrels and lizards; New York, Brooklyn, and Prospect Park; Halloween and Harry Potter; reading, dreaming, and using your imagination… this site is for you!

Here you will find a list of her works with pictures and descriptions, some biographical information, answers to questions you may have, and information for book collectors as well as tips on shopping for used books.

Want to get involved? There's a guestbook so you can leave comments, a forum so you can connect with other readers, parents, and teachers, and a mailing list you can join so you know when we have news to share!

Find out what we're all about and how you can help us and be sure to let us know if you have ideas for how to adapt or republish Ruth Chew's stories.

Works

As Author and Illustrator

As Illustrator

Book News

The ninth volume of the Japanese translation series is now available!

Website News

11 July 2010

Added details for six books (No Such Thing as a Witch, The Hidden Cave, The Secret Treehouse, The Witch's Buttons, Summer Magic, and The Wishing Tree). Added cover of Taiwanese translation of Witch in the House.

22 May 2010

Updated biographical sketch from family and added another author photo on the About the Author page.

16 May 2010

Upgraded and added cover scans. Added another author photo. Added summary and other information for several books.

15 May 2010

Added a basic guestbook and forum and instructions for joining and leaving the mailing list.

08 May 2010

Added some blog post links.

06 May 2010

Improved display of foreign books.

28 March 2010

Streamlined database tables. Improved display of book details pages. Added images for some foreign editions. Improved handling of double-title works.

21 March 2010

Redesigned header; moved links to footer. Made small improvements to database.

20 March 2010

Rescanned The Wednesday Witch at higher resolution for front page. Swapped out bookshelf photo on front page. Added biographical information from hardcover books.

15 February 2010

Launched site.

14 February 2010

Added links.

06 February 2010

Submitted site to family for input.

31 January 2010

Scanned some book covers. Created image for missing cover image.

30 January 2010

Created image for site header. Scanned author portrait.

10 January 2010

Added list of links to home page. Added database info to individual book pages. Added pages for info for collectors and foreign editions.

26 December 2009

Database-ified the books page.

22 December 2009

Set up a database and created individual book page display mechanism!

23 November 2009

Futzed with whitespace.

28 October 2009

Worked on the book list page.

Shelf full of Ruth Chew books.