Edward Irving Wortis (born December 23, 1937), better known by the pen name Avi, is an American author of young adult and children's literature. He is a winner of the Newbery Medal and twice one of the runners-up for the medal.
Eve Bjørgum Bunting (née Bolton, December 19, 1928 – October 1, 2023), better known as Eve Bunting, was a Northern Irish-born American writer of more than 250 books. Her work covered a broad array of subjects and included fiction and non-fiction books. Her novels are primarily aimed at children and young adults, but she has also written the text for picture books.
Sheila Philip Cochrane Burnford née Every (11 May 1916 – 20 April 1984) was a Scottish writer. She is best known for her novel The Incredible Journey about two dogs and a cat traveling through the Canadian wilderness.
Matthew Frederick Christopher (August 16, 1917 – September 20, 1997) was an American writer of children's books. He wrote more than 100 novels and 300 short stories, mainly featuring sports.
Beverly Atlee Cleary (née Bunn; April 12, 1916 – March 25, 2021) was an American writer of children's and young adult fiction. One of America's most successful authors, 91 million copies of her books have been sold worldwide since her first book was published in 1950. Some of her best known characters are Ramona Quimby and Beezus Quimby, Henry Huggins and his dog Ribsy, and Ralph S. Mouse.
Caroline B. Cooney (born May 10, 1947) is an American author of suspense, romance, horror, and mystery books for young adults.
Stephen Crane (November 1, 1871 – June 5, 1900) was an American poet, novelist, and short story writer. Prolific throughout his short life, he wrote notable works in the Realist tradition as well as early examples of American Naturalism and Impressionism. He is recognized by modern critics as one of the most innovative writers of his generation.
Sharon Creech (born July 29, 1945) is an American writer of children's novels. She was the first American winner of the Carnegie Medal for British children's books and the first person to win both the American Newbery Medal and the British Carnegie.
Christopher Paul Curtis (born May 10, 1953) is an American children's book author. He has won the Coretta Scott King Honor Book Award and the Newbery Honor Book Award, in addition to numerous other awards.
Marguerite de Angeli (March 14, 1889 – June 16, 1987) was an American writer and illustrator of children's books including the 1950 Newbery Award winning book The Door in the Wall. She wrote and illustrated twenty-eight of her own books, and illustrated more than three dozen books and numerous magazine stories and articles for other authors.
Jeanne DuPrau (born 1944 in San Francisco, California) is an American writer, best known for The Books of Ember, a series of science fiction novels for young people. She lives in Menlo Park, California.
Susan Fletcher (born May 28, 1951) is an American writer of fiction, primarily speculative fiction for children or young adults. She was born in Pasadena, California and has worked from Wilsonville, Oregon.
Esther Louise Forbes (June 28, 1891 – August 12, 1967) was an American novelist, historian and children's writer who received the Pulitzer Prize and the Newbery Medal. She was the first woman elected to membership in the American Antiquarian Society.
Dan Gutman (born October 19, 1955) is an American writer, primarily of children's fiction. His works include the Baseball Card Adventures children's book series that began with Honus & Me, The Genius Files Series, and the My Weird School Series.
Margaret Peterson Haddix (born April 9, 1964) is an American writer known best for the two children's series, The Shadow Children (1998–2006) and The Missing (2008–2015). She also wrote the tenth volume in the multiple-author series The 39 Clues.
Kevin Henkes (born November 27, 1960) is an American writer and illustrator of children's books. As an illustrator he won the Caldecott Medal for Kitten's First Full Moon. Two of his books were Newbery Medal Honor Books, Olive's Ocean and The Year of Billy Miller. His picture book Waiting was named both a 2016 Caldecott Honor Book and a Geisel Honor Book. It was only the second time any author has won that combination of awards.
Karen S. Hesse (born August 29, 1952) is an American author of children's literature and literature for young adults, often with historical settings. She received the Newbery Medal for Out of the Dust
Carl Hiaasen (born March 12, 1953) is an American journalist and novelist. He began his career as a newspaper reporter and by the late 1970s had begun writing novels in his spare time, both for adults and for middle grade readers. Two of his novels have been made into feature films, and one has been made into a TV series.
Iain Lawrence (born 1955) is a Canadian author for children and young adults. In 2007 he won a Governor General's Literary Award in Children's Literature for Gemini Summer, and in 2011, he was presented with the Vicky Metcalf Award for Literature for Young People.
Madeleine L'Engle (November 29, 1918 – September 6, 2007) was an American writer of fiction, non-fiction, poetry, and young adult fiction, including A Wrinkle in Time and its sequels: A Wind in the Door, A Swiftly Tilting Planet, Many Waters, and An Acceptable Time. Her works reflect both her Christian faith and her strong interest in modern science.
Lois Ann Lowry, born March 20, 1937, is an American writer. She is the author of many books for children and young adults, including The Giver Quartet, Number the Stars, the Anastasia series, and Rabble Starkey. She is known for writing about difficult subject matters, dystopias, and complex themes in works for young audiences.
Ben Mikaelsen was born on January 5, 1952, in La Paz, Bolivia, the son of missionary parents of Danish descent. He has been writing full-time since 1984 and lives in Anacortes, Washington with his wife, Connie. He has written a few books inspired by his bear, such as Touching Spirit Bear and the sequel Ghost of Spirit Bear.
Joan Lowery Nixon (February 3, 1927 – June 28, 2003) was an American journalist and author, specializing in historical fiction and mysteries for children and young adults.
Robert Leslie Carroll Conly (January 11, 1918 – March 5, 1973), better known by his pen name Robert C. O'Brien, was an American novelist and a journalist for National Geographic magazine. He is best known for his novels Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH and Z for Zachariah.
Scott O'Dell was born in Los Angeles, California in 1898. He worked as a technical director for Paramount, a cameraman for Metro Goldwyn Mayer, and a book editor of a Los Angeles newspaper before serving in the United States Air Force during World War II. He died in 1989.
Gary James Paulsen (May 17, 1939 – October 13, 2021) was an American writer of children's and young adult fiction, best known for coming-of-age stories about the wilderness. He was the author of more than 200 books and wrote more than 200 magazine articles and short stories, and several plays, all primarily for teenagers. He won the Margaret Edwards Award from the American Library Association in 1997 for his lifetime contribution in writing for teens.
Richard Wayne Peck (April 10, 1934 – May 23, 2018) was an American novelist known for his contributions to modern young adult literature. He was awarded the Newbery Medal in 2001 for his novel A Year Down Yonder (the sequel to A Long Way From Chicago). He received the Margaret A. Edwards Award from the American Library Association in 1990.
Rodman Philbrick (born January 22, 1951) is an American writer of novels for adults and children. He has written popular children's books such as Freak the Mighty, Max the Mighty, The Last Book in the Universe, and has written other mysteries and thrillers for adults.
Woodrow Wilson Rawls (September 24, 1913 – December 16, 1984) was an American writer best known for his books Where the Red Fern Grows and Summer of the Monkeys.
Pam Muñoz Ryan (born December 25, 1951) is an American writer for children and young adults, particularly in the multicultural genre. She was born in Bakersfield, California.She is half Mexican with Basque, Italian, and Oklahoman cultural influences.
Louis Sachar (born March 20, 1954) is an American young-adult mystery-comedy author. He is best known for the Wayside School series and the novel Holes.
Jerry Spinelli (born February 1, 1941) is an American writer of children's novels that feature adolescence and early adulthood. His novels include Maniac Magee, Stargirl, and Wringer.
Robert Louis Stevenson (born Robert Lewis Balfour Stevenson; 13 November 1850 – 3 December 1894) was a Scottish novelist, essayist, poet and travel writer. He is best known for works such as Treasure Island, Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, Kidnapped and A Child's Garden of Verses.
Mildred DeLois Taylor (born September 13, 1943) is a Newbery Award-winning American young adult novelist. She is best known for her novel Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry, part of her Logan family series, known for exploring powerful themes of family and racism faced by African Americans in the Deep South, in a way that is accessible to young readers.
John Ronald Reuel Tolkien (January 1892 – 2 September 1973) was an English writer and philologist. He was the author of the high fantasy works The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings.
Samuel Langhorne Clemens (November 30, 1835 – April 21, 1910), known by the pen name Mark Twain, was an American writer, humorist, and essayist. He was praised as the "greatest humorist the United States has produced," with William Faulkner calling him "the father of American literature."
Gertrude Chandler Warner (April 16, 1890 – August 30, 1979) was an American author, mainly of children's stories. She was most famous for writing the original book of The Boxcar Children and for the next 18 books in the series.
Elwyn Brooks White (July 11, 1899 – October 1, 1985) was an American writer. He was the author of several highly popular books for children, including Stuart Little, Charlotte's Web, and The Trumpet of the Swan.
Velma May Wallis (born 1960) is an American writer of Gwich'in Athabascan descent. Her books have been translated into 17 languages. Wallis was born and raised in a remote Alaskan village near Fort Yukon, approximately 200 kilometers northeast of Fairbanks.
Virginia Euwer Wolff (born August 25, 1937) is an American author of children's literature. She was the recipient of the 2011 NSK Neustadt Prize for Children's Literature, honoring her entire body of work.
G. Clifton Wisler (1950 – 2006) was an American historical novelist, the author of almost 70 books, many of them historical fiction for young adults. Wisler lived in Plano, Texas in the United States. He died on April 7, 2006.