Award Winning Leaders

In 2013, Sheri Booker published Nine Years Under, a memoir about her time working in a West Baltimore funeral home. Featured in such national outlets as The New York Times, NPR, and Essence magazine, she also won the 2014 NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literary Work from a Debut Author.

One of her professors at Notre Dame, Dr. Susan Barber, said:

I am delighted for Sheri; but I'm not really surprised. Sheri's talent was quite evident when she was in my Women's Studies course. She electrified the audience at the women's prison when she recited her poetry for them.

About Sheri Booker

Sheri J. Booker is a writer, poet, spoken word artist, and teacher. She is the author of a work of poetry, One Woman, One Hustle (2003); a Vook (digital book with text, video and Internet links), I am the Poem (2011); and the memoir Nine Years Under: Coming of Age in an Inner City Funeral Home (2013).

In 2007, she lived in rural South Africa, where she helped to teach journalism skills to African women and worked as an editorial assistant for an international literary magazine. Most recently, Sheri has discovered a passion for teaching. She currently teaches a refreshing course called Mind, Body, Soul at the Baltimore Leadership School for Young Women.

Sheri has an M.F.A. in creative nonfiction from Goucher College and a B.A. in political science from Notre Dame of Maryland University.

Visit her online at sheribooker.com.