Eric Luper

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Eric Luper is a successful author of children’s books, including young-adult novels, a middle-grades novel, and two series for younger readers. He also has contributed to renditions of Mad Libs based on Scooby-Doo, Star Trek, and Star Wars.

Photography: 
Chris Sawicki

Eric Luper was a seventh-grade multitasker, capable of listening to his teacher while composing Mad Libs to amuse his friends.

He’s still at it.

Today, Luper RC’92 is a chiropractor with a thriving sideline in writing for children. His published work includes young-adult novels set in the worlds of horse racing and poker playing; a middle-grades novel featuring cross-dressing protagonists; two series for younger readers—one about a mischievous Labrador retriever and the other about a mysterious library—and Mad Libs based on Scooby-Doo, Star Trek, and Star Wars.

For Luper, conceiving 150-word stories with missing nouns, adjectives, and exclamations is an entertaining exercise in channeling his inner middle schooler. “As I’m writing them, I’m envisioning kids doing them,” he says. “I’m thinking, ‘Which word in this sentence do I pull out to make it the funniest if the word “poop” goes in?’”

As a child, Luper was an often- reluctant reader. Not until taking a  creative writing class at Rutgers did he discover that he enjoyed inventing his own stories. Although he chose a less precarious day job, he returned to his avocation in 2000, squeezing writing into the time left over from his chiropractic work and his family life.

Juggling writing deadlines, patient care, and parenting—Luper lives near Albany, New York, with his wife and two children—requires careful planning. “I need to be very, very regimented,” he says. “I don’t have time to wait to be inspired.”

Although he has ideas for grown-up novels, for now Luper plans to stick with a younger  audience.

“Everything they experience is a new experience, and to me that’s exciting,” Luper says. “I like being there right at that early point, where these kids are becoming independent readers, where they’re gaining  independence, they’re gaining self- confidence. It’s a privilege to be there  for that.” 

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