Ann Bausum

I write about history for readers of all ages. My books for young people help upper elementary, middle school, and high school students discover the drama and significance of stories from history that may barely be presented in their textbooks. My goal is to make history relevant, engaging, alive, and irresistible. In 2015 my adopted home state named me the year's Notable Wisconsin Children's Author. Two years later the body of my work received national recognition with the Nonfiction Award of the Children's Book Guild of Washington, D.C.

Candace Fleming

Candace Fleming awarded herself the Newbery Medal in fifth grade after scraping the gold sticker off the class copy of The Witch of Blackbird Pond and pasting it onto her first novel—a ten-page, ten-chapter mystery called Who Done It? She’s been collecting awards (her own, not Elizabeth George Speare’s) ever since.

Today, Candace Fleming is the author of more than 50 books for children and young adults, including the 2021 Sibert Medal-winning Honeybee: The Busy Life of Apis Mellifera, as well as the 2021 YALSA Excellence in Nonfiction Award-winning The Rise and Fall of Charles Lindbergh. A recipient of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, she is also the two-time winner of both the Boston Globe/Horn Book Award, and the Sibert Honor. Her most recent titles are The Enigma Girls and Narwhal, Unicorn of the Arctic.

Nikki Grimes

New York Times bestselling author Nikki Grimes was inducted into the Black Authors Hall of Fame in 2023. Her honors include the CSK Virginia Hamilton Lifetime Achievement Award, the ALAN Award for significant contributions to young adult  literature, the Children’s Literature Legacy Medal, and the NCTE Award  for Excellence in Poetry for Children. Author of the Coretta Scott King Award-winner Bronx Masquerade, and five Coretta Scott King Author Honors, she won the Printz Honor and Sibert Honor for her memoir Ordinary Hazards. Her latest titles include Garvey’s Choice: The Graphic Novel, a School Library Journal 2023 Best Book; Lullaby for the King, one of Book Riot’s 25 Best Christmas Books of All Time; and A Walk in the Woods, recipient of eight starred reviews, and 11 Best Book listings for 2023, including the New York Times, NPR, and Smithsonian Magazine. Ms. Grimes lives in Corona, California.

Rafael López

Rafael López is a New York Times bestselling, award winning illustrator and artist who was born and raised in Mexico City to architect parents. His illustrations bring diverse characters to children’s books and he is driven to produce and promote books that reflect and honor the lives of all young people. He is the recipient of three Pura Belpré medals, the Schneider Family Book Award, Jane Addams Book Award, Tomas Rivera Book Award and is the illustrator of three New York Times bestsellers. He was the first guest artist of the Smithsonian National Postal Museum in 2022. López is a founder of the Urban Art Trail movement in San Diego’s East Village creating a series of large-scale murals that brought the community together. Rafael lives and works in an industrial loft in downtown San Diego and at his home/studio in the colonial town of San Miguel de Allende, Mexico.

Ellen Oh

Ellen Oh is an award-winning author and editor of numerous middle grade and young adult novels including On The Block: Stories of Home, The Colliding Worlds of Mina Lee, You Are Here: Connecting Flights, and Finding Junie Kim. A former adjunct college instructor and lawyer, Ellen is also a founding member of We Need Diverse Books, a non-profit organization dedicated to increasing diversity in children’s literature. Originally from New York City, Ellen lives in Rockville, Maryland, with her husband, three human children, and two dog children and has yet to satisfy her quest for a decent bagel.

Jasmine Warga

Jasmine Warga is the #1 New York Times-bestselling author of middle grade novels Other Words For Home, The Shape of Thunder, and A Rover’s Story. Other Words For Home earned multiple awards, including a John Newbery Honor, a Walter Honor for Young Readers, and a Charlotte Huck Honor. The Shape of Thunder was a School Library Journal and Bank Street best book of the year, a finalist for the Barnes & Noble Children's and YA Book Award, and has been named to several state award reading lists. A Rover’s Story, her latest novel, was an instant New York Times bestseller, an Indie Next List and a Junior Library Guild selection, and was named a best book of the year by Publishers Weekly and The Washington Post. She is also the author of young adult novel, My Heart and Other Black Holes, which has been translated into over 20 different languages. Her most recent middle grade novel, A STRANGE THING HAPPENED IN CHERRY HALL, was published in September 2024. Originally from Cincinnati, she now lives in the Chicago-area with her family in a house filled with books.