Mel Valentine Vargas
Mel is a Miami born, Chicago based, Latinx comic creator and illustrator. They work largely with digital media and have a BA in illustration from Columbia College Chicago.
Mel loves drawing minorities and art that their younger self needed while growing up, including hispanic main characters, non-binary characters, and bodies of all shapes.
Their work is largely inspired by LGBT, POC, and fem experiences, and is focused in graphic storytelling with themes that help highlight minority lifestyles. It is Mel's goal to ensure that their illustrations help people who are not often represented feel a little less alone and a lot more love.
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Meg Medina
Meg Medina served as the 2023-2024 National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature. She is the author of the Newbery Medal–winning book Merci Suárez Changes Gears, which was also a 2018 Kirkus Prize finalist, and which was followed by two more acclaimed books about the Suárez family: Merci Suárez Can’t Dance and Merci Suárez Plays It Cool. Her young adult novels include Yaqui Delgado Wants to Kick Your Ass, which won the 2014 Pura Belpré Author Award, and which was published in 2023 as a graphic novel illustrated by Mel Valentine Vargas; Burn Baby Burn, which was long-listed for the National Book Award; and The Girl Who Could Silence the Wind. She is also the author of picture books No More Señora Mimí / No más Señora Mimí, Evelyn Del Rey
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Christine Suggs
Christine Suggs is a comic artist and designer living in Dallas, TX with their wonderful partner, 1 dog, and 2 cats. They're currently working on a YA graphic novel about spending their summers in Mexico as a teen, set to release in 2023 from Little Brown Young Readers. Christine's work explores the intersection of their identities, namely being a queer, fat, Latinx leftist who loves all things cute. Bonus facts: their day job is in app design, they are an avid Dungeons & Dragons player, and they're quite obsessed with their cats.
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Andi Porretta
Andi Porretta is a Philly-born illustrator, storyteller, and rom-com watcher. She studied illustration and design at Pratt Institute and currently resides in Brooklyn with her best friends and pet cat. When she isn’t drawing, you might find Andi at her local coffee shop, palling around, or missing her subway stop (again). Ready or Not is her debut graphic novel.
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Julio Anta
Julio Anta is the writer of many graphic novels including the Eisner Award-nominated Frontera, This Land Is Our Land: A Blue Beetle Story, Home and Sí, Se Puede: The Latino Heroes Who Changed the United States.
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Julio was born and raised in Miami, Florida and currently resides in New York City.
Forthcoming work includes a slate of graphic novels for HarperAlley, Random House Graphic and First Second. -
Christine Suggs
Christine Suggs is a comic artist and designer living in Dallas, TX with their wonderful partner, 1 dog, and 2 cats. They're currently working on a YA graphic novel about spending their summers in Mexico as a teen, set to release in 2023 from Little Brown Young Readers. Christine's work explores the intersection of their identities, namely being a queer, fat, Latinx leftist who loves all things cute. Bonus facts: their day job is in app design, they are an avid Dungeons & Dragons player, and they're quite obsessed with their cats.
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Huda Fahmy
Huda Fahmy was born in Detroit, Michigan and attended the University of Michigan where she majored in English. She taught English to middle and high school students for eight years before she started writing about her experiences as a visibly Muslim woman in America and was encouraged by her older sister to turn these stories into comics. Huda, her husband Gehad, and their two boys reside in Houston, Texas.
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Visit her store at
www.hudafahmy.threadless.com -
Sunmi
Sunmi is a cartoonist whose body of work explores emotional distances and gender deviant fantasies, within a framework of queer + Korean histories and mythologies. Their debut YA graphic novel "Firebird" comes out with HarperAlley in July 2023.
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Jasmine Walls
Jasmine Walls is an award-winning writer, editor, and artist. She's worked on several graphic novels along with writing Vixen: NYC, and can otherwise be found drinking hot chocolate or befriending all the neighborhood dogs.
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Claire Lordon
I am an American-Canadian illustrator, designer, and author living in Vancouver, Canada. I create children's books, comics, surface designs, murals, maps, and greeting cards for a number of companies.
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I earned my BFA in illustration at the Rhode Island School of Design.
My work is inspired by my lifelong spirit for adventure, a love of the outdoors, and an enthusiasm for travel. I enjoy long distance running, hiking, lacrosse, curling, and snowboarding. -
Christine Mari
Christine Mari is a comic artist based in Los Angeles, California. When she was fifteen years old, she wrote her first book, Diary of a Tokyo Teen, an illustrated travelogue detailing one summer in Japan. Her artistic journey continued in her online comics, which deal with topics ranging from her multiracial identity to navigating adulthood and the joys and challenges of daily existence. She loves rainy days and grocery store birthday cake. This is her first graphic novel. Christine invites you to visit her at christinemari.com or follow her Instagram @christinemaricomics.
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Samuel Teer
Samuel Teer was born to a deaf maintenance worker and an immigrant that spoke English as a distant second language. Obviously he became a writer. He was raised outside of St. Louis, MO. He currently lives outside of Denver, CO with his wife Andrea (an educator) and their two dogs Roxie and Olive.
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Ngozi Ukazu
Ngozi Ukazu is an American cartoonist and graphic novelist. She is the author of the online graphic novel series Check, Please!. She studied at Yale University and the Savannah College of Art and Design.
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Kate Leth
Kate Leth is a Canadian author and illustrator working in comics, animation, design, and feelings. A grown-up goth and pop culture devotee, Kate specializes in work for kids and teens. Their comics work includes Patsy Walker, A.K.A. Hellcat!; Girl Over Paris; Spell on Wheels; and Adventure Time, among others.
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They live in Halifax, Nova Scotia with an absolutely ridiculous cat and several regrets. They are queer and genderfluid/non-binary, a fact that greatly influences their work. Kate uses they/them pronouns, but probably won’t correct you. -
Jennie Wood
Jennie Wood is a nonbinary author, comic creator, and musician, currently living in Boston. They created the critically acclaimed, award-winning Flutter graphic novel series. Featured in The New York Times, Boston Globe, and on Law & Order: SVU, Flutter was named one of the best LGBTQ graphic novels of 2013 and 2015 by The Advocate. In November 2018, Dark Horse Comics published The Flutter Collection, all three volumes combined into one book. That collection won the Next Generation Indie Book award for best graphic novel of 2019.
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Jennie is also the author of the YA novel, A Boy Like Me, which was a Next Generation Indie Book awards finalist, an INDIEFAB Book of the Year finalist, and one of Foreword Reviews’ 10 Best Indie YA novels for 2014. -
Samuel Sattin
Samuel Sattin is an American writer. His books include the multi-volume Unico series for Scholastic Graphix, Buzzing, Side Quest, The Silent End, and (as co-author) both A Kids Guide to Anime and Manga and The Essential Anime Guide: 50 Iconic Films, Standout Series, and Cult Masterpieces. He has also adapted the Academy Award-nominated films WolfWalkers, Song of the Sea, and The Secret of Kells to the graphic novel format. He graduated with an MFA in comics from the California College of the Arts and works as a studio writer for Schulz Creative Associates, aka Snoopy Central. Samuel resides with his wife in Northern California, and travels frequently to Japan.
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Thien Pham
THIEN PHAM is a comic book and visual artist, based in the Bay Area. He is also a high school teacher. Pham illustrated Gene Luen Yang's Level Up. Sumo is his first solo work.
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(from http://us.macmillan.com/author/thienpham) -
Jorge Aguirre
Jorge A. Aguirre is an East Coast-based writer born and raised in Columbus, Ohio. He wrote the graphic novel, GIANTS BEWARE (First Second Books/Macmillan), which the New York Times called, a "rollicking fun story." He also wrote its sequel, DRAGONS BEWARE (May 2015). He has already written the third book of the CHRONICLES OF CLAUDETTE. Besides books, Jorge also produces and writes TV for kids. He's worked for Disney, Junior, Nick, Jr., and PBS.
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Meg Medina
Meg Medina served as the 2023-2024 National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature. She is the author of the Newbery Medal–winning book Merci Suárez Changes Gears, which was also a 2018 Kirkus Prize finalist, and which was followed by two more acclaimed books about the Suárez family: Merci Suárez Can’t Dance and Merci Suárez Plays It Cool. Her young adult novels include Yaqui Delgado Wants to Kick Your Ass, which won the 2014 Pura Belpré Author Award, and which was published in 2023 as a graphic novel illustrated by Mel Valentine Vargas; Burn Baby Burn, which was long-listed for the National Book Award; and The Girl Who Could Silence the Wind. She is also the author of picture books No More Señora Mimí / No más Señora Mimí, Evelyn Del Rey
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Ashley Robin Franklin
Ashley Robin Franklin is an artist, cartoonist, and illustrator who currently resides in Austin, Texas. She was born in 1990 in the Rio Grande Valley, where she grew up and attended the University of Texas Pan-American. She majored in English literature with an emphasis in Creative writing, and minored in Studio Art.
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She writes and illustrates comics, journals, draws, paints, and dabbles with various other artistic projects and mediums (including stamp carving, screen printing, acrylic painting, collage, etc.). Some of her greatest influences include her father, who is an art teacher and painter, manga, anime, films, indie comics, children's books, lowbrow art and tattoo culture, zine/diy culture, the occult, folklore/mythology and literat -
Faith Erin Hicks
Born in the wilds of British Columbia, the young Faith frolicked among the Sasquatch native to the province before moving to Ontario at age five. There she was homeschooled with her three brothers, and developed an unnatural passion for galloping around on horseback, though never without a proper helmet (because you only get one skull). After twenty years of suffering through Ontario’s obscenely hot summers, she migrated east, and now lives beside the other ocean in Halifax, Nova Scotia. She worked in animation for a bit, and now draws comics full time. She’s not sure how that happened either.
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Vera Brosgol
Vera Brosgol was born in Moscow, Russia in 1984 and moved to the United States when she was five. She received a diploma in Classical Animation from Sheridan College, and currently works at Laika Inc. in Portland, Oregon drawing storyboards for feature animation.
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She has done illustration work for clients such as Nickelodeon, Sony Computer Entertainment, and Simon & Schuster. Her first graphic novel, Anya's Ghost, was published in 2011 by First Second Books.
She loves knitting, baking, and trying not to kill her plants. She hopes you are enjoying looking at her drawings! -
Gene Luen Yang
Gene Luen Yang writes, and sometimes draws, comic books and graphic novels. As the Library of Congress’ fifth National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature, he advocates for the importance of reading, especially reading diversely. American Born Chinese, his first graphic novel from First Second Books, was a National Book Award finalist, as well as the winner of the Printz Award and an Eisner Award. His two-volume graphic novel Boxers & Saints won the L.A. Times Book Prize and was a National Book Award Finalist. His other works include Secret Coders (with Mike Holmes), The Shadow Hero (with Sonny Liew), Superman from DC Comics (with various artists), and the Avatar: The Last Airbender series from Dark Horse Comics (with Gurihiru). In 201
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Deb J.J. Lee
Deb JJ Lee is a Korean American artist currently living in Brooklyn, NY. They have appeared in the New Yorker, Washington Post, NPR, Google, Radiolab, PBS, and more. Books they have illustrated include The Invisible Boy by Alyssa Hollingsworth (Roaring Brook Press, 2020) and The Other Side of Tomorrow by Tina Cho (HarperCollins, 2024). They enjoy reality tv, sparkling water, and pretending to be an extrovert.
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Sunmi
Sunmi is a cartoonist whose body of work explores emotional distances and gender deviant fantasies, within a framework of queer + Korean histories and mythologies. Their debut YA graphic novel "Firebird" comes out with HarperAlley in July 2023.
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Claire Lordon
I am an American-Canadian illustrator, designer, and author living in Vancouver, Canada. I create children's books, comics, surface designs, murals, maps, and greeting cards for a number of companies.
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I earned my BFA in illustration at the Rhode Island School of Design.
My work is inspired by my lifelong spirit for adventure, a love of the outdoors, and an enthusiasm for travel. I enjoy long distance running, hiking, lacrosse, curling, and snowboarding.