Two years ago, when corona spread just after my session break, I was promoted to class 5. My mother, brother and I went to visit my father in Delhi. The first few days into lockdown were fun. I had no school and teachers to worry about. But after that it became boring and that’s when my parents gifted me my first Diary of a Wimpy Kid books.
They gave me four books from the series- Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Last Straw, Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Long Haul, Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Old School and Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Double Down. The books were very interesting to read and from then on Jeff Kinney, the writer of the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series became my favourite author.
Jeff Kinney was born on February 19, 1971 in Maryland. It is a state in the middle Atlantic region of the eastern United States. Jeff Kinney is an author, cartoonist, game designer, producer and also an actor. He grew up in Fort Washington and attended the Potomac Landing Elementary School. Later, he graduated from Bishop McNamara High School in 1989. He also attended the University of Maryland in the early 1990s. This is where Jeff Kinney ran a comic strip called “Igdoof’ in the campus newspaper, The Diamondback. He also created the child-oriented website Poptropica which includes two islands called ‘Wimpy Wonderland and Wimpy Broadwalk’. The kid characters of the Wimpy Kid are shown in the Poptropica. He originally majored in computer science but then shifted to criminal justice so that he would have more time to work on his comic. He was induced into Omicron Delta Kappa as an alumnus of the University of Maryland in 2021.
Jeff Kinney has two siblings- Scott Kinney and Patrick Kinney. Jeff Kinney lives in Massachusetts with his wife, Julie Kinney and his two sons Will and Grant Kinney.
In 1998, Jeff Kinney came up with an idea of a middle schooler named Greg who writes illustrated stories about his personal life in his diary. In May 2004, Kinney released an online version of the story titled ‘The Diary of a Wimpy Kid’. He updated regularly on the website till June 2005. Then after about 8 years of working in the online website, he went to a New-York publisher, Mr. Harry Abrams. Finally, in the year 2006, Jeff Kinney signed a deal with Harry a multi-book deal and then Diary of a Wimpy Kid was released as a print media in 2007. The book was an instant hit. The online version of the book received 20 million views until 2007. Till now 18 books have been published under the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series including a movie diary, Do-It-Yourself book and also a biography of Greg’s best friend, Rowley Jefferson.
. In 2009, TIME named Jeff Kinney ‘The World’s most Influential People’. In 2010, 2011, 2012, 2014, 2015, 2016, the Wimpy Kid series won the Kids choice award for favourite book. Till now, 250 million copies of Wimpy Kid have been sold globally.
The main character of these books Greg Heffley thinks that he will be a famous person when he grows up. The Wimpy Kid series depicts the daily life of Greg. I have all Diary of a Wimpy Kid books. They are so good that I have read each book many times. Once a person starts reading the book, it is very hard to stop reading.
I hope that Jeff Kinney will write more books under this series so that I can know more about Greg’s life.
By – AAYUSHI SEN
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