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Living and creating with my partner is one of the great joys of my life. Love is an experience. Love is work. It comes with ease and also requires discipline. Don’t think about it too much. Just do it.
If you are a teen librarian, please feel free to use any of these techniques to make sure THREAT OF THE SPIDER is at the top of your circulation list!
With Dan in Green Gables, I’d like to pay homage to a book that helped me through difficult times—and offer some compassion and love to my relatives in the Smoky Mountains by focusing on happy memories of them, and what could have been, if they’d only embraced me.
Sometimes, in order to honor their whole personage, instead of choosing approval or someone else’s desire, girls must choose themselves.
Big or small, we need to be talking about our boobs, especially with young women. Maybe our new battle cry for boobs should be, “We must—we must—we must DISCUSS our busts!”
A romantic comedy is delightful enough on its own, but traveling to a new destination through the eyes of one’s protagonist brings with it an additional sense of escapism and adventure, especially if traveling in real life isn’t possible.
Author Ann Braden tackles difficult subject matter in her middle grade books. But she knows the value of an escapist read and wants the children's publishing world to respect and understand the kids who reach for "Wimpy Kid" more often than a title deemed to have more literary merit.
By sounding a warning before the catastrophe comes, it might motivate some readers to find ways to take action to mitigate the very worst of it.
When I sat down to write VESUVIUS, my debut YA historical fantasy set in the final days of Pompeii, I did so to put queer people back in the narrative.
Eventually, the time will come when you have to go your own way like me and Aaliyah. You’ve got this and if nobody else believes in you, don’t worry—I do.
In a policy void, educators seek to maximize learning, turning to core skills, chiefly reading.
Books are crucial tools in understanding the lives of those who may look or sound a little different from the majority.
If Castle Swimmer sounds like a story you would enjoy, then I have some additional, queer YA comics I’d like to recommend, in celebration of Pride Month.
When I told my mother about my newest adventure, she jokingly sang the refrain she used to sing to me and my siblings when she suspected we were up to no good: “Someone’s gonna end up cry-ing!”
Of course, the problem with being a writer is that you’re always writing. I literally couldn’t help myself – every step of that journey, I was making a book inside my head.
Giving all the attention to the showier talents prevents us from seeing the true potential of many of the kids in our lives as well.
I hope you enjoy every step of their story, spend some well-earned time-away-from-time in Pocket, and try dressing for your own fairy tale.
I hope readers close this book feeling the same kind of sleepy magic you experience watching the sunrise after a night spent sitting up and laughing with your best friends.
I wanted warmth to radiate off the page. Kids deserve a model of what respect looks like, what empathy looks like, what support looks like. Especially nowadays.
It took many drafts to get the Alligator Witch of West Bay right; mythmaking takes time and energy.
Books can show you a world where you belong, not just by yourself, but with a whole bunch of other people who understand you and care about you.
The authors join us to talk about their experience writing THE COOKIE CRUMBLES and THEIR JUST DESSERTS together.
My new middle grade novel, This Cookie Will Change Your Life, is a love letter to libraries, which is a funny thing to write, but it’s true.
In Judaism, neshama describes the holy, everlasting spark inside every human being that lasts in the universe, even after a person passes away.
I was about to enter middle school, and I desperately yearned for a new obsession that could distract me from reality. I found it in the form of a cassette tape of the latest Backstreet Boys single, “All I Have to Give.”
A parent complaint about a nonbinary snail led a Virginia elementary school principal to cancel a visit by author Erica S. Perl. A former trial attorney, Perl offers a lesson in smart booking contracts and standing up to book and author challenges.
I always imagined GAMERS as a celebration of video games and how they can connect people, and I hope this book appeals to those who grew up playing them as much as those who are still growing up.
Certain kinds of important, difficult, and formative queer experiences are not being truthfully explored in books for queer teens—primarily, I believe, because they make adult gatekeepers uncomfortable.
The characters in Love at Second Sight are not direct parallels to the Scooby Doo crew despite referencing them at one point, but they were one of many inspirations. And with that, I would like to introduce the Love at Second Sight characters through the lens of Scooby Doo.
Teen librarian Karen Reflects on thoughts about teen pregnancy and women's rights throughout the years as a teen librarian and as the mother to teen girls
Eventually, I decided that the nefarious plotting of my young tontine contenders was not only acceptable for middle grade but also funny—for the same reason that Home Alone is a comedy and not a horror movie.
Optimism fosters a sense of collective action and shows that no effort is too small.
Losing anyone you love is a miserable, painful, and heartbreaking experience. But losing a friend is uniquely strange in the sense that the world isn’t really equipped to keep you in mind as you grieve.
Author Regina Linke talks about bringing ancient traditions to today's young readers
Archaeologists, by definition, must care about the past; we wouldn’t be in this line of work if we didn’t. To care about the past, we have to connect to it. And it’s imagination, whatever form it takes, that makes this connection possible.
Our characters, Bee and Alice, talk about the same things middle-grade readers do: how the world works, bodies, queerness, and what is fair and right.
Where are the very real depictions of us saying, “yes, we have the thing, and it sucks, but we can still have amazing lives anyway, even when the disability causes us hardship.”
The hope is that LGBTQ+ teens can see that positive change is doable, even in difficult conditions, and that although it may not feel like it sometimes, it matters. They matter.
Maybe this book about love, empathy, community and fighting for all of those things when the world wants to break our spirit & hearts, is coming out at the exact time it needs to come out.
I appreciate their clear-eyed distrust of many long-held ideas and conventions. I’m encouraged about the future when I hear their incisive analyses and their validation of a variety of identities.
Starred reviews are always good news, for what they mean and for what happens next.
Teen librarian Karen Jensen reflects on the suffering of children and recently proposed changes to child labor laws
Disabled people deserve to appear in a variety of positive storylines, the same ones in which abled and neurotypical characters typically populate.
My big hope is that after reading my book, kids will discuss and debate and define true kindness for themselves. Spread kindness like confetti—yes! But let’s also plant it deep inside.
What looks like a cute, illustrated graphic novel about two girls falling in love in bright, vivid color, is also a deep narrative about unfair labor practices, the place of women in society and work, and the power of queer love.
For Jewish children, the Passover seder offers a portal to that world of greater meaning, but it’s one that’s often hard to access. In my new graphic novel One Little Goat, my goal is to open that door.
My grandparents may be long gone, but with Isle of Ever, I can’t help but feel this new story is as much theirs as it is mine.
Vampires face an interesting dilemma in immortality. Their bodies, generally, remain the same while their minds change and while the world changes. Context matters. What does it mean to be queer in 1960 vs. 2010 vs. 2025?
The platform no longer serves our mission or reflects our values.
Starred reviews have a big problem. And it begins and ends with the 10 points in this list.
In this week's Sunday Reflections, teen librarian Karen Jensen reflects on how the concept of DEI relates to her personal and professional life and the concept of the Imago Dei
In The Peach Thief, my 13-year-old protagonist—a starving workhouse girl—poses as a boy in order to get a tenuous job scrubbing pots in the all-male world of an earl’s walled kitchen garden.
Even as we need to keep telling the painful truth of book bans, we also need to take extra care to celebrate and elevate the unique gifts that each book offers.
Science fiction is fun, curious, and adventurous. It bends the reality of our world and stretches our imaginations to explore all the “what ifs” floating within our universe.
Sunday Reflections: I’m Just a Mother Wanting Her Daughters to Have More Rights Than I Did, Not Less
A reflection on Women's History Month, being a mother of daughters, and the looming specter of Project 2025
She was a bit shaky at first but persevered through nerves and emotion to tell her story. My mother's testimony bore witness to injustice. Stories matter.
Tear This Down is a book that I hope will spark lively discussions about topics that are front-and-center in today’s news: women’s rights, voting rights, and social justice.
If someone wants to ask if I planned the significance of these objects, you can tell them yes: with plane flights and research and a lifetime of reading about boats and sand and magical balloons that make large distances small, I planned it all.
I truly, firmly, believe that anyone can write a book. The thing that stops most people, isn’t talent, it’s time.
I was naive. I didn’t think we needed Almost Sunset.
Topics that drew reader attention in an eventful first week of February 2025.
This story begins with two middle school librarians, miles and miles apart, who both feel passionately that what publishers call middle grade literature is not what their students need or want.
Slowly but surely a story formed in my mind. It featured a mystery, ghosts, clever tweens, a notorious graveyard . . . and a countdown. A terrifying countdown.
We create the place we live in, but it also creates us, and it’s impossible to tell where one influence starts and the other begins.
Most people can’t imagine a world without the worst of human nature because that would be the purview of a different species: a post-miserable humankind.
Teen librarian Karen Jensen shares the disturbing erasure of government websites
Given the current backlash, with anti-DEI legislation and sentiment festering, we risk losing ground on fairness and equality when we need it most.
I’m convinced that pumping books instead of iron is a better way of dealing with the insecurity and isolation affecting so many kids these days, especially boys.
This is what I’d like to pass along to young readers: No one is perfect. Every one of us has our flaws, but we can grow and change, make a difference and achieve great things.
Benthic burrows, rabbit holes, whatever you call them: they are detours well worth the extra mileage. And mostly—they’re not even detours. They’re part of the journey.
While depression can be debilitating - I definitely don’t want to minimize its seriousness - it’s important for readers to meet role models who successfully manage their mental health and manage to achieve their familial and career ambitions.
I’ve been thinking for a while about the question of how stories relate to truth.
And as an author, I’ve had the privilege of seeing the effect teachers and librarians have every time I visit a school.
Science makes you think, but like art or literature, it can also make you laugh, dream, see and appreciate the world, or even just your own brain, in new, exciting ways.
If there’s one takeaway I’d like all readers to get, it’s that they matter, just as they are, and they deserve to follow their dreams.
Being a late bloomer is not a sign of failure, but a testament to the unique growth that is allowed when we give ourselves the grace to bloom in our own time.
My hope is that my book adds to the canon of mythological stories so that more kids can find themselves reflected in the story, especially kids that might have grown used to feeling “othered.”
Truthfully, although I write about destroying giant, horrible monsters, I’ve never quite been able to vanquish the imposter beast. But I’ve learned how to work around it.
Once upon a time, a reader asked me that age old question: "Where do your ideas come from?" I leaned into the mic and with complete sincerity gave them the best answer I could: "Keanu Reeves."
Humans haven’t stepped onto the Moon since 1972. Now, more than 50 years later, American astronauts are planning to head back, this time to stay.
If you’re looking to foster a love for fantasy that’s sure to last a lifetime, here are six spectacular, inclusive (and more or less recent) middle grade fantasy books to gift this holiday season.
Being vulnerable on the page hasn’t been easy. Opening myself up to judgement—both good and bad is terrifying.
This Thanksgiving season, I’ve been thinking about all the ways libraries have influenced my life.
A national network of organizations revitalizing communities through public spaces, Reimagining the Civic Commons offers helpful information for libraries to connect their efforts to larger goals, as well as to the work of their neighbors.
I am essentially making comfy nests where other tired hearts can rest, books with arguably naive but stubborn resilience against tough odds, and books with kind power in them.
The trick is to not give up while the slow burn runs its course.
I hope after reading our novel, hearts can empathize better with refugees in the community and be spurned to action. Perhaps students will take greater interest in the new classmate that just arrived in the states.
As it turns out, becoming a writer for teens—and teen Jan—is about the most thrilling and rewarding answer to the question: who am I?
Writing Lucy was our way of coping with the years Teghan lost: both the years trapped in self-denial about her identity and the years she spent in prison. The book is a badge of honor for those tough years we survived, and it’s a love letter to each other.
I discovered that if told with some heart and soul, history can be as compelling as fine fiction. And before long I found myself on a mission to make history come alive for young people.
Anthologies are the literary equivalent to a buffet dinner. They offer a wide selection of different perspectives (both in story telling and in personal background) and writing styles on the same theme.
Critiquing how the military preys on low-income families with promises of education and employment does not sound like something that would be in a graphic novel targeted at children aged ten and up, but that is the message at the narrative’s core.
There is a joy to asking questions and learning new things. It’s fun to explore, and to find the answer to a question. It’s exciting to learn that the world works in ways we did or did not expect.
Shakespeare’s greatness can live on, but we can also give space to new voices - and both can happen at the exact same time with the power of a retelling.
The Donut Prince of New York isn't just about donuts or theater or football. It's about the revolutionary act of accepting yourself in a world that often suggests you shouldn't.
Middle grade may not have been in my initial career plans as an author, but now I can’t imagine writing without it.
Here is a small selection of twenty books which score 8/10 or higher on my personal "Fear Factor" grading used in The YA Horror 400.
Readers are "questioning everything," including librarians in popular culture.
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