As a writer, Kathleen Thompson was first known for the feminist classic Against Rape (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1974), written with Andra Medea. This landmark book broke the silence about rape in our society.
Thompson exposed the American diet industry’s exploitation of women in Feeding on Dreams (MacMillanUSA), written with psychologist Diane Pinkert Epstein and published in 1996.
In 1998, Thompson was co-author, with pre-eminent black woman historian Darlene Clark Hine, of A Shining Thread of Hope: The History of Black Women in America. (Broadway Books), after first serving as Hine’s associate editor on the Encylopedia of Black Women (Facts on File, 1994) Thompson also served on the board of senior editors with Hine, Deborah Grey White, Brenda Stephenson, and others on the second edition of the landmark encyclopedia Black Women in America (Oxford University Press, 2005).
She then collaborated with Hilary Mac Austin on three visual histories: The Face of Our Past: Images of Black Women from Colonial America to the Present (Indiana University Press, 1999), Children of the Depression (Indiana University Press, 2000), and America’s Children: Repicturing Childhood from Exploration to the Present (W. W. Norton).
In addition to these adult trade books, she has written more than one hundred books for children and young adults, including the Portrait of America series.
Individual Books and Series
Against Rape Children of the Depression America’s Children: Picturing Childhood from Early America to the Present Black Women in America Feeding on Dreams Hispanic Biographies Raintree Stories Portrait of America Other Children’s Books