Berkley, California (November 10, 1931 – September 20, 2014) 82 yrs

Joan Cooper known by her pen name, J. California Cooper, an American playwright and author. She wrote 17 plays and was named Black Playwright of the Year in 1978 for her play Strangers. Cooper received an American Book Award in 1989, a James Baldwin Writing Award (1988), and a Literary Lion Award (1988) from the American Library Association. . Cooper published her first novel, Family, in 1991. Five novels followed. In many of her published works, Cooper stays true to the theme of writing out the lives of different poor to middle-class African-American women who must overcome individual hardships to pursue happiness. Many of her protagonists are in search of love and/or respect from their partners, and while doing so face other obstacles such as abuse, rape, resentment, childhood trauma, racism, and white supremacy. Cooper’s stories are usually told in first-person narration and are told in a gossipy style.