杰夫·金尼

杰夫·肯尼（英语：Jeff Kinney，1971年2月19日—）是一位美国作家和漫画家，出生于马里兰州华盛顿堡。他是知名漫画作品逊咖日记的天才。

杰夫·肯尼毕业于马里兰大学。1998年起，他开始创作关于一个名为格雷·海夫利（Greg Heffley）、常将日常生活记录于日记当中的一个中学生的故事。2004年杰夫·肯尼将作品上传至网络上，取名《逊咖日记》（Diary of a Wimpy Kid）。在2006年举办的第一届纽约漫画展，杰夫·肯尼与艾伯兰书商签约，《逊咖日记》正式出版。

Jeffrey Patrick Kinney (born February 19, 1971) is an American author and illustrator. He is best known for creating, writing and illustrating the children's book series Diary of a Wimpy Kid. He also created the child-oriented website Poptropica.

Early life

Kinney was born on February 19, 1971, in Fort Washington, Maryland, a Washington D.C. suburb. He was raised in Fort Washington, and attended Potomac Landing Elementary School and later Bishop McNamara High School, where he graduated in 1989. He has an older brother and sister, and a younger brother. He is of Irish descent.

He attended the University of Maryland, College Park, in the early 1990s. It was in college that Kinney created a popular comic strip, Igdoof, which ran in the school student newspaper, The Diamondback. Kinney graduated from the University of Maryland in 1993, originally majoring in computer science but switching to criminal justice in order to have more time to work on his comic. In 2021 he was inducted into Omicron Delta Kappa as an alumnus of the University of Maryland.

Diary of a Wimpy Kid book series

In January 1998, Kinney conceived the idea of a middle-school wimp named Greg Heffley, who writes illustrated stories about his personal life. In May 2004, Funbrain and Jeff Kinney released an online version of the story, titled Diary of a Wimpy Kid. The website made daily entries from September of that year to June 2005. He worked on his book for almost eight years, before showing it to a publisher in New York City, U.S.

In February 2006, during the New York Comic Con, Kinney signed a multi-book deal with publisher Harry N. Abrams, Inc., to turn Diary of a Wimpy Kid into a print series.

The book became an instant hit, with the online version receiving about 20 million views as of 2007. When many online readers requested a printed version, Kinney agreed, and in April 2007, Diary of a Wimpy Kid was published. To date, 31 Wimpy Kid books have been released, including a tie-in book for the first film instalment entitled The Wimpy Kid Movie Diary, the Do-It-Yourself Book, and three spinoff books from the perspective of Greg's best friend Rowley Jefferson. In April 2009, TIME named Kinney one of The World's Most Influential People. In 2010, 2011, 2012, 2014, 2015, and 2016 the series won a Nickelodeon Kids Choice Award for Favorite Book. The series is still ongoing, with the latest mainstream book called Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Partypooper.

To promote the release of Diary of a Wimpy Kid: No Brainer, Kinney embarked on book tour across the West Coast of the United States titled "The No Brainer Show" from October 23 to November 8, 2023. Kinney dedicated the tour to libraries and librarians, making a personal donation of $100,000 for libraries along the tour. He also partnered with 11 publishers to acquire "high interest, diverse books to distribute to libraries and to kids we meet along the way". Each stop featured a game show hosted by Kinney, where participants could win prizes on behalf of their local library.

Professional work

Kinney works full-time as a writer and illustrator. He also created the kid-friendly website Poptropica which includes two islands called "Wimpy Wonderland" and "Wimpy Boardwalk", where the Diary of a Wimpy Kid characters and events are featured in the Poptropica universe.

Over 300 million copies of the Diary of a Wimpy Kid books have sold globally as of late 2025 and the series was developed into feature films for which Kinney served as executive producer.

In May 2015, Kinney and his wife Julie opened "An Unlikely Story," a local bookstore and cafe in Plainville, Massachusetts. Kinney advocates that kids should spend time reading as an alternative to screen time.