Brenda Rufener
Brenda Rufener is a technical writer turned novelist and the author of WHERE I LIVE, which Bustle named a most anticipated YA contemporary book hitting shelves in 2018 and Jennifer Niven called a “hard-hitting novel filled with hope.”
SINCE WE LAST SPOKE, Brenda’s second young adult novel, arrived April 2019 and received a starred review from School Library Journal, among other honors.
When not writing, Brenda enjoys hiking the woods of North Carolina and spending time with her family. She is an advocate for homeless youth.
If you like author Brenda Rufener here is the list of authors you may also like
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C.G. Drews
CG Drews is the award-winning author of The Boy Who Steals Houses and NYT Bestseller Don’t Let The Forest In, which is also a Junior Library Guild Gold Standard Selection, Indie Next Pick, and Barnes & Noble YA Book Club Pick. Their next YA horror, Hazelthorn, is out October 28th, 2025, with debut adult horror, You Did Nothing Wrong, coming in 2026. Their work has been translated into six languages, received a nomination for the 2020 CILIP Carnegie Medal, and won the 2020 CBCA Honour Award. CG lives in Australia, never sleeps, and is forever buried under a pile of unread books. Find on Instagram as @paperfury, TikTok as @cgdrews, and at cgdrews.com.
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Jennifer Dugan
Jennifer Dugan is a writer, geek, and romantic who writes the kinds of stories she wishes she had growing up. In addition to being a young adult novelist, she is also the writer/creator of two indie comics. She lives in New York with her family, dogs, and an evil cat that is no doubt planning to take over the world.
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Jessica Pennington
Jessica Pennington is no stranger to the combination of love and drama. She’s a wedding planner, after all. A writer since the age of ten—when she sought publication for her poem about a tree—Jessica likes the challenge of finding the humor in a sad situation or highlighting the awkwardness in a romantic one. She lives in a Michigan beach town suspiciously similar to the one in her novel, with her husband Josh and their son, Rory. She is the author of Love Songs & Other Lies, and When Summer Ends (April 2019). Find Jessica on twitter at @jessnpennington and IG @jessicapennington
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Sandhya Menon
Sandhya Menon is the New York Times bestselling author of several novels with lots of kissing, girl power, and swoony boys. Her books have been featured in several cool places, including on The Today Show, Teen Vogue, NPR Book Review, Buzzfeed, and Seventeen. A full-time dog servant and part-time writer, she makes her home in the foggy mountains of Colorado.
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Katherine Webber
Katherine Webber was born in Southern California in 1987. She has lived in Hong Kong, Hawaii, and Atlanta. She currently lives in London with her husband, Kevin, and their young daughter. In addition to her YA, Katherine also co-writes young fiction, as Katie Tsang, with Kevin.
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Katherine studied Comparative Literature at the University of California, Davis and Chinese literature and language at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. She has worked at an international translation company, a technology startup, and a reading charity. She now writes full time.
She loves an adventure, whether it is found in a book or in real life and has travelled to over 45 countries. Travel, books, and eating out are her favourite indulgences. -
Stacey Trombley
Stacey Trombley is the author of several fantasy romance series including WICKED FAE and SHADOW HILLS ACADEMY. Her places to travel list is almost as long as her to-be-read list. Most recently, she spent 9 months living in a van with her family, traveling the US and Mexico. She has many more adventures in mind, both on Earth and in her imagination.
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Follow her journey on Instagram and Tiktok @StaceyTrombleyAuthor and learn more about her books at www.StaceyTrombley.com -
Jeff Zentner
Jeff Zentner is the author of The Serpent King, which Kirkus Reviews named one of the best books of the 21st Century, as well as In the Wild Light, Goodbye Days, Rayne & Delilah’s Midnite Matinee, Colton Gentry's Third Act, and Sunrise Nights, coauthored with Brittany Cavallaro. He has two books—Wayfarers and Love, Like Apples—forthcoming in 2026.
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Among other honors, he has won the ALA’s William C. Morris Award, the Amelia Elizabeth Walden Award twice, the Muriel Becker Award, the International Literacy Association Award, been longlisted twice for the Carnegie Medal, and is a two-time Southern Book Prize finalist.
His books have been translated into fifteen languages and been featured on The Today Show, Good Morning America, and in Vanity Fa -
Holly Bourne
Holly started her writing career as a news journalist, where she was nominated for Best Print Journalist of the Year. She then spent six years working as an editor, a relationship advisor, and general ‘agony aunt’ for a youth charity – helping young people with their relationships and mental health.
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Inspired by what she saw, she started writing teen fiction, including the best-selling, award-winning ‘Spinster Club’ series which helps educate teenagers about feminism. When she turned thirty, Holly wrote her first adult novel, 'How Do You Like Me Now?', examining the intensified pressures on women once they hit that landmark.
Alongside her writing, Holly has a keen interest in women’s rights and is an advocate for reducing the stigma of mental -
Stephanie Kate Strohm
Stephanie Kate Strohm is the author of Love a la Mode; Prince in Disguise; It's Not Me, It's You; That's Not What I Heard; The Date to Save; and Katy Keene: Restless Hearts. She grew up in Connecticut and attended Middlebury College in Vermont, where she was voted Winter Carnival Queen. Currently she lives in Los Angeles with her husband and son. Her middle-grade debut, Once Upon a Tide: A Mermaid's Tale, will be released in September.
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Jessica Spotswood
Jess is the author of the historical fantasy trilogy The Cahill Witch Chronicles and the contemporary novels Wild Swans and The Last Summer of the Garrett Girls. She is the editor of the anthologies A Tyranny of Petticoats and The Radical Element, and co-editor (with Tess Sharpe) of Toil & Trouble: 15 Tales of Women & Witchcraft. Jess lives in Washington, DC, where she works for the DC Public Library as a children’s library associate. Her newest book is Great or Nothing, a World War II-era retelling of Little Women in which each March sister is written by a different author.
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Tahereh Mafi
Tahereh Mafi is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of the Shatter Me series. She was born in a small city somewhere in Connecticut and currently resides in Santa Monica, California with her husband, fellow author Ransom Riggs. She can usually be found over-caffeinated and stuck in a book. Shatter Me is her first series, with television rights optioned by ABC Signature Studios; Furthermore, her first middle grade novel, is on shelves now, and Whichwood, its darker companion, will be on shelves November 14, 2017.
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Heather Gudenkauf
Heather Gudenkauf is the Edgar Award nominated, New York Times & USA Today bestselling author of ten novels, including The Overnight Guest and her most recent thriller Everyone is Watching. Her debut novel, The Weight of Silence, was an instant NYT bestseller and remained on the list for 22 weeks. Gudenkauf’s critically acclaimed novels have been published in over 25 countries and have sold over 2.5 million copies worldwide. Her books have been featured on many Best Of roundups including lists by The New York Times, The Washington Post, NPR, Amazon, Apple Books, GoodReads, and more. Her eleventh novel, The Perfect Hosts will be released on November 4, 2025. Heather lives in Iowa with her family.
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Swati Avasthi
Swati Avasthi has a BA from the University of Chicago and an MFA from the University of Minnesota. She has received numerous awards and grant, most recently from the Minnesota State Arts Board. Her first novel, Split, has received a silver parents' choice award and a CYBILS award and was named a best books for young adults, 2011 from YALSA. Split was also nominated for a GoodReads Choice Award and a Minnesota Book Award. She is keeping her fingers crossed.
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Suzanne Young
Suzanne Young is the New York Times bestselling author of The Program, The Treatment, and several other novels. She currently lives in Tempe, Arizona where she teaches high school English and obsesses about books. Learn more about Suzanne at www.suzanne-young.blogspot.com
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Jennifer Lynn Barnes
Jennifer Lynn Barnes (who mostly goes by Jen) was born in Tulsa, Oklahoma. She has been, in turn, a competitive cheerleader, a volleyball player, a dancer, a debutante, a primate cognition researcher, a teen model, a comic book geek, and a lemur aficionado. She's been writing for as long as she can remember, finished her first full book (which she now refers to as a "practice book" and which none of you will ever see) when she was still in high school, and then wrote Golden the summer after her freshman year in college, when she was nineteen.
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Jen graduated high school in 2002, and from Yale University with a degree in cognitive science (the study of the brain and thought) in May of 2006. She'll be spending the 2006-2007 school year abroad, -
Catherine Ryan Hyde
Catherine Ryan Hyde is the author of more than 50 published and forthcoming books.
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She is co-author, with publishing industry blogger Anne R. Allen, of How to be a Writer in the E-Age: a Self-Help Guide.
Her bestselling 1999 novel Pay It Forward was made into a major Warner Brothers motion picture. It was chosen by the American Library Association for its Best Books for Young Adults list, and translated into more than two dozen languages for distribution in over 30 countries. Simon & Schuster released a special 15th anniversary edition in December of ’14.
Pay It Forward: Young Readers Edition, an age-appropriate edited edition of the original novel, was released by Simon & Schuster in August of ‘14. It is suitable for children as young as eig -
Wendelin Van Draanen
Wendelin Van Draanen has written more than thirty novels for young readers and teens. She is the author of the 18-book Edgar-winning Sammy Keyes series, and wrote Flipped which was named a Top 100 Children’s Novel for the 21st Century by SLJ, and became a Warner Brothers feature film with Rob Reiner directing. Her novel The Running Dream was awarded ALA’s Schneider Family Award for its portrayal of the disability experience.
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Van Draanen's latest book, Hope in the Mail, is part memoir, part writing guided, designed to encourage aspiring writers to pursue their dream.
Van Draanen is also the author of two short chapter-book series. The Gecko & Sticky books, are fun read-alouds, perfect for reluctant readers, and the Shredderman books—featuring -
Chris Bohjalian
Chris Bohjalian is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of 25 books. His 25th book, THE JACKAL’S MISTRESS, is now on sale. He writes literary fiction, historical fiction, thrillers, and (on occasion) ghost stories. His goal is never to write the same book twice. He has published somewhere in the neighborhood of 3.5 million words.
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His work has been translated into 35 languages and become three movies (MIDWIVES, SECRETS OF EDEN, and PAST THE BLEACHERS) and an Emmy-winning TV series (THE FLIGHT ATTENDANT). He has two other novels in development for TV series as well.
He is also a playwright, including THE CLUB in 2024; MIDWIVES in 2020; and GROUNDED (now WINGSPAN) in 2018.
His books have been chosen as Best Books of the Year by the Washing -
Allison L. Bitz
Allison L. Bitz hails from Lincoln, NE, where she lives with her spouse and two kids. Her superpower is empathy, and she’s been known to have resting tell-me-your-life-story face. Allison holds a PhD in Counseling Psychology and has worked as a licensed psychologist since 2012. When she’s not working on a novel or counseling, Allison is more than likely writing a song, getting riled up about something political, or trying to track down a pastry to enjoy with her coffee. She has a soft spot for rescue animals, which are vying for species majority in her home (two perfect dogs, two ornery cats). The Unstoppable Bridget Bloom is her debut novel. You can learn more about Allison at www.AllisonLBitz-author.com, or follow her on Twitter, Instagra
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Jennifer Chen
Jennifer Chen is a freelance journalist who has written for print and online, including pieces in the New York Times, O: The Oprah Magazine, Real Simple, and Bust. She earned an MFA and BFA in dramatic writing from New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts, and is a proud alumnae of Hedgebrook, a women’s writing residency. She lives in Los Angeles with her TV writer husband, twins, two pugs, and a smoky black cat named Gremlin.
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Suzanne Park
Suzanne Park is a Korean-American writer who was born and raised in Tennessee. In her former life as a stand-up comedian, she was a finalist in the Oxygen Network's "Girls Behaving Badly" talent search, and appeared on BET's "Coming to the Stage." Suzanne was also the winner of the Seattle Sierra Mist Comedy Competition, and was a semi-finalist in NBC's "Stand Up For Diversity" showcase in San Francisco alongside comedians Ali Wong and Nico Santos.
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More info about her books can be found at https://linktr.ee/suzannepark -
Emma Lord
Emma Lord is an NYT bestselling author of rom coms for teens and adults, a BuzzFeed senior writer, and dessert gremlin living in New York City. She graduated from the University of Virginia with a major in psychology and a minor in how to tilt your computer screen so nobody will notice you updating your fan fiction from the back row. Her sun sign is Cancer and her moon sign is whatever Taylor Swift song is about to pop up on shuffle.
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Stacey Trombley
Stacey Trombley is the author of several fantasy romance series including WICKED FAE and SHADOW HILLS ACADEMY. Her places to travel list is almost as long as her to-be-read list. Most recently, she spent 9 months living in a van with her family, traveling the US and Mexico. She has many more adventures in mind, both on Earth and in her imagination.
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Follow her journey on Instagram and Tiktok @StaceyTrombleyAuthor and learn more about her books at www.StaceyTrombley.com -
Nina Kenwood
Nina Kenwood is the author of The Wedding Forecast, Unnecessary Drama, and It Sounded Better In My Head.
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Allison L. Bitz
Allison L. Bitz hails from Lincoln, NE, where she lives with her spouse and two kids. Her superpower is empathy, and she’s been known to have resting tell-me-your-life-story face. Allison holds a PhD in Counseling Psychology and has worked as a licensed psychologist since 2012. When she’s not working on a novel or counseling, Allison is more than likely writing a song, getting riled up about something political, or trying to track down a pastry to enjoy with her coffee. She has a soft spot for rescue animals, which are vying for species majority in her home (two perfect dogs, two ornery cats). The Unstoppable Bridget Bloom is her debut novel. You can learn more about Allison at www.AllisonLBitz-author.com, or follow her on Twitter, Instagra
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