Giddings Public Library and Cultural Center

Morgan L. Busse writes steampunk and fantasy fiction. She is the author of multiple series including The Ravenwood Saga, Skyworld, and The Nordic Wars. She is a three-time Christy Award finalist and winner of the INSPY, the Carol, and the Realm Award in Christian speculative fiction. During her spare time, Busse enjoys spending time with her family, playing both board and video games, taking long walks, and dreaming about her next novel. Visit her online at www.morganlbusse.com.

Angela Castillo is the award-winning author of more than 45 books for adults and children. She is from Bastrop, where she lives with her husband, four children, and two cats. At age 8, she wrote her first book in green crayon. Castillo loves to write in many different genres, including historical fiction set in Texas, children's picture books, fantasy, and even a space opera. She gleans story ideas from her children and her job as a charter-school aide.

Sharon Feldt is the author of six children’s books. The newest series features 9-year-old red-headed Sarah O’Shea and her dog Claude, who lead readers through laugh-out-loud adventures. The first book The Scary Hair of Sarah O’Shea won the Grand Prize in the Red City Review. Feldt owns a bookstore in Sulphur Springs, where she has lived for the past 20 years after retiring from teaching kindergarten in Houston. She edits a local Sulphur Springs magazine. 

Feldt taught creative writing to a local home school consortium, which published an anthology of the students’ work. She has a monthly radio spot reviewing books on KSST. Feldt serves as vice president of the Silver Leos Writers’ Guild, which is associated with the alumni group of Texas A&M Commerce. Her work appears in five anthologies published by the Guild. 

Feldt is working on two more children’s books, and an anthology of her work over the years. She lives in Sulphur Springs with her Goldendoodle, Percy the Shop Dog.

Brenda Ethridge Ferguson was born in Dallas but grew up on a ranch in Central Texas, where she lived among cows, sheep, goats, and (in the summer) turkeys. She later taught English at secondary and college levels, designed and wrote English courses, was a librarian and library coordinator in public schools, and for a time, lived abroad as a military spouse. 

Besides her middle-grade chapter books, Ferguson has written book reviews for library publications as well as short stories and articles for magazines and newspapers. Her books reflect her love of children, families, adventure, and rural life. Additionally, she and her husband raised two sons and now live on their Texas ranch.

Award-winning sci-fi/fantasy author Jamie Foley loves strategy games, homesteading, and running away into wild nature to write. When she's not designing bespoke book interiors or typesetting, she's probably battling red wasps with her teal lightsaber. She and her technomancer husband live with their hyperactive spawnlings in a hobbit hole between the Texas Hill Country and the family cattle ranch. Formerly a web production specialist at Thomas Nelson/HarperCollins Publishers, an art director at an ad agency, and director of marketing and creative director at Enclave Publishing, Foley is currently raising tiny humans.

Nancy Golden is a wordsmith with an inquisitive mind and adventurous spirit. She has held many positions in her life, ranging from assistant manager of a pet shop to a semiconductor test engineer, and most recently, a mentor and coach to software boot campers. She has always had a heart for pouring into her community, including teaching ESL and starting a writers group in Carrollton.  

Golden has a love of learning about other cultures and believes we are much richer when we open our hearts and minds to one another. She also finds that the more we get to know each other, we discover we have more in common than we are different. She and her husband Phil call Texas home, and when she's not working on her books, you can find Golden riding either horses or bicycles.

Writing across genres, she recently completed a very fun fantasy trilogy: the Dynamis novels. Golden's books provide a great reader experience with well-crafted writing that will brighten your day. Her best piece of advice: Keep reading and never pass up the opportunity to ride a dragon! Learn more about Golden and her books at nancygoldenbooks.com.

Lila and Rick Guzmán are the award-winning authors of young-adult novels about the American Revolution. The Lorenzo novels (Arte Publico Press) tell the story of Spain's role in our fight for freedom. In Lorenzo's Secret Mission, Lorenzo joins a flatboat flotilla delivering supplies from the Spanish in New Orleans to General Washington. The Houston Chronicle called the book "the Spanish Johnny Tremain." 

Lorenzo's Revolutionary Quest is based on the first cattle drive in American history. Longhorns were driven from San Antonio to Louisiana to feed Spanish soldiers fighting the British. In Lorenzo and the Turncoat, a hurricane in 1779 batters New Orleans just before General Galvez attacks the British in Baton Rouge.  

Rick Guzmán was born in Galveston, a town that was named for General Galvez. Lila Guzmán has published three stories in Chicken Soup for the Soul.

 April Henley is an indie author out of Houston and a proud Baylor Bear. She crafted her first stories as a child before her passion caught fire in a creative writing class in high school. She wrote the beginnings of a story that she would revisit through college and her 20s, and in 2023, she published Treasures in a Bottle, the world's first novel coloring book. Her first love is fantasy, with narratives that blend legend and folklore with magic, mythical creatures, and fantastic settings. When she's not writing or reading, Henley's outside interests include horseback riding, Renaissance festivals, cosplay, food, and travel.

Chantal Henry Johnson is an artist and author who loves Jesus, her husband, her children, and her grandchildren. She loves the wide open spaces, the big blue skies, and the flowers that bloom along the highways and byways of Texas, where she lives. Johnson loves sharing stories, flower-filled mason jars, and creating friendships with others, whether they are near or far. Ophelia and Her Wishblooms is her second children's story published by Lucid Books.

Johnson is also a Bible-study leader and writer. She weaves her love of art, the written word, and God’s word together to create beautiful reminders of His love for us. Her multimedia creations have been featured in magazines, but what she loves most about her art is that it brings people to Jesus. Johnson has written three women's Bible studies.

Jeff Kerr is a crime fiction author known for the Adam Cash mystery series, a gripping collection of modern whodunits set in the rugged Texas Hill Country. Drawing on his deep love for the region’s sprawling landscapes and complex communities, Kerr creates atmospheric mysteries with sharp dialogue and richly drawn characters. His protagonist, Adam Cash, a sharp-witted sheriff’s deputy, navigates the murky waters of shocking crimes and small-town secrets with courage, wit, and tenacity. Kerr’s Texas roots inject real-world authenticity into his stories, keeping his readers up way past their bedtimes.

A diary keeper, a journalism major, a public relations executive, now a children’s author — Lindsay Leslie has always operated in a world of written words. She likes to bring her unique outlook on life, quirky humor, and play with words to the page in picture books. She is the award-winning author of Gus Hearts the Bus (A Junior Library Guild Gold Standard Selection), So You Want to Build a Library, Dusk Explorers (an SCBWI Crystal Kite Award winner, Bank Street Best Book of 2021 with Outstanding Merit, and Amazon Editors’ Pick), Nova the Star Eater, and This Book Is Spineless. She lives in Austin, Texas, with her husband, sci-fi/fantasy novelist Ryan Leslie, two teenagers, and two fur-beasts (a.k.a. dogs).

Lyndsey Lewellen is the Christy Award-winning author of The Chaos Grid duology and the Harlow Morgan series. Growing up on a healthy dose of comic books, punk music, and sci-fi, she infuses all three loves into novels written for young adults. Inside her “what if” worlds, her characters take risks, grow, and fight for what matters. When she’s not writing or whittling down her endless TBR, Lewellen designs novel covers and paints on shoes. She lives on a small Texas farm with her best friend/husband, five children, and what some might call a zoo of animals (especially after meeting the peacocks).

Vivian McCullough is an award-winning author and experienced genealogist. Her debut novel Pawnee Prisoner: The Story of Jane Gotcher Crawford won the 2026 Texas Authors Texas Best Book Award for Best Historical Fiction Biography, in addition to placing as a finalist in the 2025 American Writing Awards for Western. Her second novel Texas Tainted Dreams won the 2026 Texas Authors Texas Best Book Award for Best Historical Fiction Western. Both books are based on the true story of the Gotcher family of Bastrop and Lee Counties. McCullough is the mother of two and grandmother of nine. She resides in North Texas and enjoys reading, research, and being with family.

Shannon L. Mokry grew up in sunny California and now calls Texas home. She lives there with her husband, two of her daughters, her loyal service dog, and a lively flock of chickens. In recent years, she has embraced the role of homeschooling mom — a calling she finds both deeply challenging and incredibly rewarding.

Mokry began her writing journey with a series of picture books about Bubbles, the bubble-blowing dragon. Inspired by her youngest daughter, those early stories sparked a passion that continues to grow. As her children grew, so did her storytelling, leading her into the world of middle-grade fiction with her Gemstone Dragons series, beginning with Bubbles's hatching story. From there, she expanded her work to include stories featuring animals with unique differences, highlighting themes of kindness, resilience, patience, and understanding.

Mokry's books often reflect her heart for children and young families, blending gentle life lessons with imagination and adventure. With many more characters and stories waiting to be told, she looks forward to continuing her writing journey — where creativity, faith, and family life come together on every page.

Elizabeth Dettling Moreno is a wife, mother, grandmother, and friend with a heart for teaching, storytelling, and sharing. She spent 24 years as a public-school teacher in Texas and was a widow for two years before becoming Mrs. Randy Tolman on November 6, 2021. She kept Moreno as her pen name to keep from confusing her readers. She and her husband Randy Tolman now live in Wharton. Moreno has five children, 16 grandchildren, and 14 great grandchildren. She can be contacted by email at praise77488@sbcglobal.net or on Facebook @Sanchothesillybillygoatandfriends.

Brenda O’Bannion's first children’s book was published by Tadpole Press. Since then, she has authored two more children’s books, one of which is a chapter book about bullying, What’s Up, Cody? In 2020, Tranquility Press released her first novel, By and By, I Reckon, a parallel memoir. The Land Before Us, Farrowlee Mountain, and Winding Roads are from her Wonderful West Virginia series. Her newest release Rivers of Dust (March 2026) is set in Texas. 

 O'Bannion is frequently invited to be the visiting author at book clubs. She is a member of several local and national writing organizations. Her books are filled with faith, love and hope.

Charles Lynn Russell retired from a 34-year career in education, where he served as a teacher, football coach, principal, and superintendent of schools before retiring to write and sell his books. He is an award-winning author, having won the Word Wrangler Reviewers' Choice Award for 2024. He has published 11 books, with a twelfth to be in print this summer. He and his wife, Patricia, also a retired teacher, reside in Potosi, Texas, on a 30-acre farm. Besides writing, Russell and his wife are active in the First Central Presbyterian Church in Abilene.

Kathleen J. Shields is an award-winning, multi-genre author best known for The Hamilton Troll Adventures, which earned First Place Best Educational Children’s Series from the Texas Association of Authors. Her childhood creation The First Unibear, written at age 10, has won six awards and counting. She also received global recognition for The First Unicorn, a Christian children's book.  

While awaiting illustrations, Shields writes chapter books for tweens and general audiences, blending education with engaging stories to inspire a lifelong love of reading and possibly writing. Her current works in progress consist of a full-length novel version of The First Unicorn and a planned seven-book series titled The Immortal Explorer. 

Shields wrote How to Write, Market and Sell Children's Books, a comprehensive guide for aspiring authors seeking knowledge on publishing children's books. She openly shares her decades of knowledge with fellow writers, and is always eager to help others grow in their craft.  

In addition, Shields writes an inspirational blog about her experiences as an author, entrepreneur, and Christian, offering thoughtful, uplifting insights meant to spark reflection and gather future readers. You can learn more about her online at www.kathleenjshields.com.

A graduate of Texas A&M University and a retired high school teacher, Laura Lynn Smith spent two decades teaching English, speech, theater, and journalism, coaching high school journalists to state championships in UIL journalism and state and national individual writing awards in other journalism contests. Her students' newspaper was among the top 15 online student papers in the nation multiple times. 

 Smith was the Canyon ISD and Region 16 Teacher of the Year in 2008-2009 and received the UIL Interscholastic League Press Conference Edith Fox King Award in 2011. In 2016, she received the Texas Association of Journalism Educators Trailblazers Award and the UIL Sponsor Excellence Award.

After retiring from public education, Smith ventured into writing fiction and continues to work as a judge for student journalism contests. A native and long-time resident of the Texas Panhandle, she now resides in Central Texas.

Mike Vance is the author of 14 non-fiction books on Texas history, sports, and comedy, and four historical fiction novels. He has written, produced, and directed eight feature length Texas history documentaries and more than 150 short educational Texas history films. Before his writing career, Vance spent 20 years as a professional stand-up comedian and musician before working on-air in radio and television. He has taught Houston and Texas history at Rice University’s Glasscock School of Continuing Studies for more than a decade. He currently serves on the Austin County Historical Commission and the Houston Astros Hall of Fame Committee.

Cindy Vincent, M.A. Ed., is the award-winning author of the Buckley and Bogey Cat Detective Capers, a middle-grade mystery series for kids and cat-lovers alike. Cindy has also penned the Tracy Truworth, Apprentice P.I., 1940s Homefront Mysteries; the Maddie Montgomery Mysteries; and The Light: A Destiny Moments Novel, which hit the Amazon bestsellers list. 

Vincent is also the creator of the Mysteries by Vincent murder mystery party games and the Daisy Diamond Detective Series games for kids, for which she holds a U.S. Patent in game design. A self-professed "Christmas-o-holic," she spends most of October preparing for her ever-expanding, extreme Christmas lights display each year. 

She lives and loves life in Houston, along with her husband and an assortment of fantastic felines. (And yes, she took inspiration for her middle-grade mysteries from the real Buckley and Bogey — two rescued black cats who seemed to run surveillance on her house each and every night.)

Courtney Woodruff is an adoptee, adoptive parent, and communications professional living in Fort Worth with her husband and three sons. She is the author of the Juniper Spark series, a collection of children’s chapter books featuring themes of foster care, adoption, and blended families. The books give kids with related experiences opportunities to see themselves reflected in new book characters. 

Woodruff writes to encourage children who feel different or carry hard experiences to see their story as a source of strength, courage, and compassion, and help them understand that what they’ve been through can become the very thing that helps them uplift others.

She received a master’s degree in counseling with a focus on resilience. She loves to spend time with her family (especially outdoors or around a table), read biographies, travel, and stargaze with friends. Woodruff has a heart for foster care, adoption, and military families, and she believes God does good, unimaginable things through our skills, stories, and passions — our fishes and loaves — when we give them away.

 Connect with her on Instagram @courtneywoodruffbooks.