“I like their letters,” she says. says Publisher’s Weekly in 2010. “I kept one from a kid, on my fridge, and it says, ‘Thank you for writing this book, it was the second greatest book I’ve ever read.’ I love it, and I always wonder what was the first greatest book that kid ever read.
In 2002, Ms. MacLachlan Won the National Medal of Humanities for his work.
Patricia Marie Pritzkau was born on March 3, 1938 in Cheyenne, Wyo. His father, Philo Pritzkau, a North Dakota native who had taught in Wyoming, was an education professor. His mother, Madonna (Moss) Pritzkau, was an English teacher and homemaker.
The family moved to Minnesota and later to Storrs, Connecticut, where her father taught at the University of Connecticut and where Patricia attended high school.
As an only child, she told The Times in the 1986 article: “Looking back, I see that I write books about siblings, about what constitutes a family, what works and what nourishes.”
She earned a bachelor’s degree in education from the University of Connecticut in 1962. She married Robert MacLachlan Jr., psychologist, the same year. They were together until his death in 2015.
Later in her career, Ms. MacLachlan wrote several picture books with her daughter, Emily MacLachlan Charest.
In addition to her son John, Mrs. MacLachlan is survived by her daughter; another son, Jamison; and six grandchildren.
