KEYNOTES

George M. Johnson (they/them) is an Emmy nominated, award-winning, and bestselling Black nonbinary author and activist. They have written on race, gender, sex, and culture for Essence, the Advocate, BuzzFeed News, and Teen Vogue. George has appeared on BuzzFeed’s AM2DM as well as on MSNBC. They are also a proud HBCU alum twice over and a member of Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Incorporated. Their debut memoir, All Boys Aren’t Blue, was a New York Times bestseller and garnered many accolades. It was the second-most banned book of 2022 in the United States, according to the American Library Association. For their work fighting book bans and challenges, the National Coalition Against Censorship (NCAC) honored George with its Free Speech Defender Award, and TIME Magazine named them one of the “100 Next Most Influential People in the World.” While writing their memoir, George used he/him pronouns. Originally from Plainfield, New Jersey, they now live in Los Angeles, California.

A.S. King is the award-winning author of many acclaimed books for young readers. She has won the Michael L. Printz award twice, in 2024 for the anthology The Collectors, and in 2020 for Dig. The New York Times called her "one of the best YA writers working today." In 2022, she was awarded the American Library Association's Margaret A. Edwards Award for her significant contribution to YA literature. King lives with her family in Pennsylvania, where she returned after living on a farm and teaching adult literacy in Ireland for more than a decade.

Charly Palmer is a graphic designer, illustrator, and the Coretta Scott King John Steptoe New Talent Award winner for Mama Africa!. As a child, he was fascinated by Ezra Jack Keats’s illustrations for The Snowy Day, which inspired Charly’s own use of color and geometric shapes. He studied art and design at the American Academy of Art and the School of the Art Institute, both in Chicago.

Ibi Zoboi is the New York Times bestselling author of American Street; Nigeria Jones, a Coretta Scott King Award winner; Pride; My Life as an Ice Cream Sandwich; Okoye to the People: A Black Panther Novel for Marvel; and the Walter Award and LA Times Book Prize–winning Punching the Air, cowritten with Exonerated Five member Yusef Salaam. She is also a two-time Coretta Scott King Honor Award winner for her picture book The People Remember and her middle grade biography of Octavia Butler, Star Child. She is the editor of the anthology Black Enough. You can find her online at ibizoboi.net.

SPEAKERS

Samira Ahmed is the New York Times bestselling author of Love, Hate, & Other Filters and Internment. She was born in Bombay, India, and has lived in New York, Chicago, and Kauai, where she spent a year searching for the perfect mango. She invites you to visit her online at samiraahmed.com and on Twitter and Instagram @sam_aye_ahm.

Hanna Alkaf is a critically acclaimed author of books for kids and teens, including The Weight of Our Sky, The Girl and the Ghost, Queen of the Tiles, Hamra & The Jungle of Memories and the upcoming The Hysterical Girls of St. Bernadette's. She is also co-editor of the YA anthology The Grimoire of Grave Fates, co-creator of the MG horror series Tales from Cabin 23, and editor of the upcoming MG Southeast Asian fantasy anthology The Beasts Beneath the Winds. Hanna graduated with a degree in journalism from Northwestern University and is a Freeman Award winner and a Kirkus Prize finalist. She lives in Kuala Lumpur with her family.

Lily Anderson is the author of several novels for young adults including The Only Thing Worse Than Me Is You, Not Now Not Ever, and Undead Girl Gang. A former school librarian, she is deeply devoted to Shakespeare, fairy tales, and podcasts. Somewhere in Northern California, she is having strong opinions on musical theater.

Adam Boardman is an illustrator and writer based in Leeds, UK. He has worked on several nonfiction titles for publishers including Nobrow / Flying Eye, Usborne and What on Earth Books. Beyond the realm of publishing, he has illustrated for clients such as Deloitte, The Economist and the Science Museum Group. Adam’s work is characterised as clean and direct, with an interest in charm and detail.

Dakota Brown has held several awards and degrees, all of which he was asked to return to their proper owners. When he's not pilfering prizes, Dakota writes for stage, animation, and comics. He is the author of Death Comes for the Toymaker from Magma Comix and Grandma Tilly’s Hell-Tech Mech from Band of Bards. A passionate improviser, Dakota is a graduate of a satellite of the New Actors Work Shop and has studied at Second City and under the late improv guru Keith Johnstone.

Jordan K. Casomar is a Black writer from West Des Moines, Iowa. He holds an MFA in Creative Nonfiction from the University of Minnesota. He was selected for a MacDowell Fellowship in 2021, received a Minnesota State Arts Board Artist Initiative grant in 2017, and is an alum of the Voices of Our Nations Arts Foundation workshop for BIPOC writers. He currently lives in Washington, DC, with his wife, their son, and their two cats. He works as a professional Dungeon Master and creative writing instructor for teens. How to Lose a Best Friend is his debut novel.

Veronica Chambers is an author and currently a writer/editor for The New York Times. Born in Panama and raised in Brooklyn, her work often reflects her Afro-Latina heritage. She’s written the acclaimed memoir, Mama’s Girl which has been adopted by hundreds of high schools and colleges throughout the country. She has also authored several children’s books including the NYT bestselling Finish the Fight, Call and Response, Shirley Chisholm Is a Verb and The Go-Between.

Gina Chew is a storyteller with a BA(Hons) in English Literature from the National University of Singapore. Her series, Another Day in Paradise, was showcased at the 39th Busan International Short Film Festival and Series Mania 2021. She published her graphic novel, Afterlife, with Difference Engine and participated in the 2023 Singapore Writers Festival. Currently, she is developing her prose manuscript as part of the NAC-NLB Writer’s Lab.

Preeti Chhibber is the author of the forthcoming YA rom-com Payal Mehta's Romance Revenge Plot, as well as a speaker and freelance writer. She also used to work as a publishing professional. She has written for SYFY, Polygon, BookRiot, BookRiot Comics, The Nerds of Color, and The Mary Sue, and others. She co-hosts the podcasts Desi Geek Girls and Tar Valon or Bust.

Becky Cloonan is an artist and writer, best known for her comic work with DC, Dark Horse, Image, and Marvel. Her illustrations have found their way onto album covers, gig posters, and even a couple of buildings. Newly relocated to the PNW, she is taking advantage of the many rainy days to draw as much as she can. Currently Becky is focusing on her new creator-owned book with DSTLRY, and she is VERY excited about it.

Corey Egbert is an illustrator based in Virginia. He believes in creating imaginative and hopeful art that empowers young people to make their world better. He lives with his wife, son, and three cats in a little house by the woods.

Sarah Everett is the author of The Probability of Everything as well as several books for teens. Charlotte’s Web was the first book that ever made her cry, and while she despises spiders, she still has an abiding love of stories that move her. When she is not reading or writing, she is dreaming about summer, gearing up for her next travel adventure, perfecting her tree pose, or yodeling with her dog. She lives in western Canada.

Award-winning author and journalist Gayle Forman has written several bestselling novels for children and adults, including Not Nothing, the Just One series, and the number one New York Times bestseller If I Stay, which has been translated into more than forty languages and in 2014 was adapted into a major motion picture. She lives in Brooklyn, New York, with her family.

Stephanie Hans is a seasoned illustrator. She works mostly for the books mainstream market with clients as big as Marvel, DC Comics, Image Comics, Dark Horse, Valiant, Dynamite, Vertigo, and Boom Studios.

Rebecca E. Hirsch, Ph.D., is an award-winning author of books about science and nature for young readers. A trained botanist, certified master gardener, and lover of scary stories, she enjoyed exploring Mother Nature's sinister side while researching and writing A Deathly Compendium of Poisonous Plants. She lives in State College, Pennsylvania, alongside poisonous plants that lurk in her garden and creep in the woods nearby.

Kim Johnson held leadership positions in social justice organizations as a teen and in college and is now an author and educator. Kim's bestselling novel, This Is My America, won numerous accolades, including the Pacific Northwest Book Award and Malka Penn Human Rights Award for Children's Literature. Her second novel, Invisible Son, is another thriller ripped from the headlines. Both novels were selected as NPR Best Books. The Color of a Lie is her first historical thriller.

Amanda Jones has been an educator for 22 years and is the President of the Louisiana Association of School Librarians. She was the 2021 School Library Journal Co-Librarian of the Year, 2021 Library Journal Mover & Shaker, and 2020 Louisiana School Librarian of the Year. Amanda is a sought-after keynote speaker at national and international conferences. Amanda co-founded the Livingston Parish Library Alliance to defeat censorship attempts in her community and is a founding member of the Louisiana Citizens Against Censorship, which fights against censorship efforts across the state. She lives in Livingston Parish, Louisiana.

Emily Lloyd Jones grew up on a vineyard in rural Oregon, where she played in evergreen forests and learned to fear sheep. She has a BA in English from Western Oregon University and a MA in publishing from Rosemont College. She currently lives in Northern California, where she enjoys wandering in redwood forests. Her young adult novels include Illusive, Deceptive, The Hearts We Sold, The Bone Houses, and The Drowned Woods. You can find her at emilylloydjones.com.

Kifurai is an illustrator, full-time animal lover, and the creator of the graphic novel Two Tails. Starting from entering children's drawing contests, she continues her interest by studying illustration at Institut Kesenian Jakarta. Creating cute-looking characters to accompany her narrative art is what she lives for, and writing stories with animal characters that highlights animal welfare with a taste of Indonesian culture brings her the most joy. She has worked with independent artists & companies for projects such as music video storyboarding, merchandise illustration, company mascots, and digital content.

Melanie Lee is a writer and educator. She has authored a variety of children's books, including the picture book series, The Adventures of Squirky the Alien, which picked up the SCBWI Crystal Kite Award in 2006, and Amazing Ash & Superhero Ah Ma, a graphic novel trilogy that won the Singapore Book Awards Best Young Person's Title in 2023 and the 2024 Hedwig Anuar Children's Book Award. You can find out more about her work at http://melanielee.sg

With training as a child life specialist and thanatologist, Dr. Korie Leigh has over 20 years of experience working with children and families experiencing grief and loss. She’s an associate professor and program director, the author of the picture book What Does Grief Feel Like? and teen book It Won’t Ever Be the Same. Dr. Leigh speaks and presents at national and regional conferences on issues of grief, loss, and coping.

David Levithan is the author of several books for young adults, including Lambda Literary Award winner Two Boys Kissing; Every Day; Nick & Norah’s Infinite Playlist and Dash & Lily’s Book of Dares (co-authored with Rachel Cohn); Will Grayson, Will Grayson (co-authored with John Green); and Boy Meets Boy. In 2016, David received the Margaret A. Edwards Award for his significant and lasting contribution to young adult literature.

Debbie Levy is the award-winning author of many books for young people, including the New York Times best-selling I Dissent: Ruth Bader Ginsburg Makes Her Mark (Sydney Taylor Book Award, National Jewish Book Award, Orbis Pictus Honor); Becoming RBG: Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s Journey to Justice (Bank Street College Best Children’s Book, Nerdy Book Award for Graphic Novels, YALSA Great Graphic Novel for Teens); and This Promise of Change: One Girl’s Story in the Fight for School Equality (with Jo Ann Allen Boyce) (Boston Globe-Horn Book Award, Robert F. Sibert Honor). Before she started writing books for young people, Debbie was a newspaper editor, and before that, she was a lawyer.

Ann Sei Lin is a writer and librarian with a love for all things fantasy. Though London is now her home, she spent several years living and working in Chiba, Japan. When not writing, she is often studying, gaming, or trying to make that origami rabbit for the one hundredth time.

Judy I. Lin, #1 New York Times-bestselling author of the Book of Tea duology (A Magic Steeped in Poison and A Venom Dark and Sweet), was born in Taiwan and immigrated to Canada with her family at a young age. She grew up with her nose in a book and loved to escape to imaginary worlds. She now works as an occupational therapist and still spends her nights dreaming up imaginary worlds of her own. She lives on the Canadian prairies with her husband and daughters.

Charis Loke is an illustrator and comics editor based in Malaysia. After discovering Shaun Tan’s, The Arrival in a school library as a teen, she fell in love with visual storytelling. Charis is co-editor of the comics anthologies SOUND (2020) and DELAY (2025) from Difference Engine and has worked with close to a hundred Southeast Asian creators as an editor for nonprofits and publishers. She makes fantasy maps and book art and has illustrated titles by Fonda Lee, Judy I. Lin, Vanessa Le, Kacen Callender, Polly Ho-Yen, and Hanna Alkaf.

Tula Lotay is the pen name of illustrator Lisa Wood. Born and raised in Yorkshire, England, Tula specializes in comics, film, and editorial illustration and founded the world-renowned Thought Bubble Festival. In 2019 Tula was awarded the Bob Clampett Humanitarian Award by the San Diego Comic Con Eisner committee for her charitable and fundraising work. Her Eisner-nominated comixology Originals book, Barnstormers, debuted in 2022. Her clients include: DC Comics, Marvel Entertainment, Image Comics, Warner Brothers, Disney, Playboy, Variety, Simon & Schuster, NBA, Rebellion, Dynamite Entertainment, BOOM! Studios, Archie Comics, Studio Pow, Cohen Media Group, Lionsgate, TIME Magazine and more.

Elizabeth Lowham dreams of a future house that is seventy-percent library with at least three lavish window seats. Her reality is five bookshelves and a rocking chair, which isn’t so bad. She is the author of Beauty Reborn, and in addition to reading and writing, her hobbies include sewing, sketching, dancing, eating, and other -ing verbs. Plus yoga. She has a Bachelor of Arts in English and works as an author, editor, and screenwriter. She lives with her husband and son in the Loveland area of Colorado.

Morgan Matson is the New York Times bestselling author of six books for teens, including Since You’ve Been Gone and Save the Date, and the middle grade novel The Firefly Summer. She lives in Los Angeles but spends part of every summer in the Pocono Mountains.

Auburn Morrow dropped out of college for English but ended up becoming an author anyway. When they’re not writing, they’re learning new hobbies, playing video games, or crying over their K-pop biases. Together with their best friends (their sister and nephew), they live in Georgia and dream about one day adopting cats.

Emma K. Ohland has been telling stories since before she knew how to write them down. She grew up in the middle of a cornfield in Indiana, but her imagination often carried her away to other worlds. When she’s not writing, reading, or smelling books, she enjoys traveling, crocheting, and daydreaming in coffee shops. She is also the author of the YA novel Funeral Girl and a contributor to the YA anthology Out There: Into the Queer New Yonder. You can find her online at emmakohland.com.

Clare Osongco is a biracial Filipina American writer living in Los Angeles. Driving Home to You is her debut novel. She enjoys mangos with bagoong, mechanical keyboard sounds, and writing super early in the morning when it's easier to pretend the rest of the world doesn't exist.

Patricia Park is a tenured professor of creative writing at American University, a Fulbright Scholar in Creative Arts, and a Jerome Hill Artist Fellow. Her debut YA novel, Imposter Syndrome and Other Confessions of Alejandra Kim, received starred reviews from Kirkus Reviews and School Library Journal and was an NPR Book of the Day. Patricia’s newest novel, What’s Eating Jackie Oh? is inspired by her love of competitive TV cooking shows and creating somewhat edible meals from leftovers. It was also inspired by Patricia’s New York Times op-ed, “I’m Done Being Your Model Minority.” She lives in Brooklyn, New York.

Arif Rafhan is an award-winning comics artist based in Kuala Lumpur. His contribution includes Malaysia's longest-running humour magazine, Gila-Gila, as well as under Lat’s upcoming graphic novel, Mat Som 2. His graphic novel, Amazing Ash & Superhero Ah Ma 2, a collaboration with writer Melanie Lee, won Best Young Person's Title at the Singapore Book Awards (2023) and Hedwig Anuar Children’s Book Award (2024).

NoNieqa Ramos is an educator and storyteller who knows diverse books written by BIPOC and LGBTQIA+ authors save lives. Their work includes the young adult novels The Disturbed Girl’s Dictionary and The Truth Is, as well as several picture books. Connect with them at www.nonieqaramos.com.

Wayne Rée (he/they) is an award-winning Singaporean writer. Together with Benjamin Chee, he co-created the prose/comics hybrid, Work-Life Balance, and its accompanying text-based game, Internal Damnation. Work-Life Balance is currently being developed into an animated series by Robot Playground Media. He also co-created the comic, Worlds Apart: A Conversation About Mental Health (with Nurjannah Suhaimi), and the horror audio series, Ghost Maps (with Kyle Ong). In July 2023, Wayne was a resident at the National Centre for Writing in Norwich, where he started work on his first novel. He lives with his wife and their cat/gremlin.

YA debut author Mason Stokes is a professor of English at Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs, New York, where he teaches African American literature and queer fiction. In addition to his scholarly writing, Stokes is the author of the adult novel Saving Julian and the personal essay “Namesake,” which was selected by Jonathan Franzen for inclusion in the 2016 edition of Best American Essays.

Jill Thompson graduated from The American Academy of Art in Chicago and went on to make a name for herself in comics, stage, film, television, and even wrestling. She's won several Eisner Awards, particularly for her skill in painting.

Trang Thanh Tran is the author of She Is a Haunting, a William C. Morris Debut Award finalist and an instant New York Times bestseller. They write speculative stories with big emotions about food, belonging, and the Vietnamese diaspora. They grew up in a big family in Philadelphia, then abandoned degrees in sociology and public health to tell stories in Georgia. When not writing, they can be found over caffeinating on iced coffee and watching zombie movies.

Vikki VanSickle is the author of a number of acclaimed novels for children including P.S. Tell No One, Words That Start With B, Summer Days, Starry Nights, and the 2018 Red Maple award-winning The Winnowing. She has also written the picture books If I Had a Gryphon, Teddy Bear of the Year, Anonymouse, How to Decorate a Christmas Tree, and Into the Goblin Market. Vikki started her career as an independent bookseller and spent 12 years working in children's publishing. A devoted member of the Canadian children's book world, she curates and presents regular book segments for CTV Your Morning and balances her writing with her advocacy work in menstrual equity.

Kalela Williams is a writer, an educator, and a historian. She is the Director of Writing of Mighty Writers, a Philadelphia-based organization that hosts writing workshops for young people, and she recently concluded almost a decade of public programming with the Free Library of Philadelphia, where she directed their One Book, One Philadelphia program and other literary initiatives. She is also the founder of Black History Maven, a social media and in-person gathering community. Kalela grew up in Atlanta, Georgia and currently calls Philadelphia home.

Born in 1997 in Tegucigalpa, Honduras, Bessie Flores Zaldívar is a writer and professor of fiction. They’re currently based in the New Haven area. Libertad is Bessie’s debut novel.

MODERATORS

Beth Atwater, apart from a brief stint in publishing, has worked in libraries since she was a teenager. She is now the Collection Development Librarian for Adult Fiction and DVDs at the Johnson County Library in Kansas. She also reviews Romance for Publisher’s Weekly and just finished serving as a movie Screener for the True/False Film Festival. Beth’s always looking for ways to highlight a good story and was honored to be recognized as the Public Library Association’s 2020 Allie Beth Martin winner. 

Monisha Blair is the Head Librarian at Key Middle School in Springfield, VA. She also reviews graphic novels, middle grade fiction, picture books, and young adult fiction for School Library Journal. She served on the SLJ Best Books Committee for Middle Grade Fiction from 2020-2023. You can find her on all social media platforms as @monishablair.

Edi Campbell, Cunningham Memorial Library, Indiana State University

Denise Dávila is an assistant professor of children's literature and literacy education at the University of Texas at Austin who has served on multiple book award committees. Her research agenda focuses on families' engagement with children's books by/for/and about members of marginalized communities to support early literacy development.  

Monica de los Reyes is editorial assistant of The Horn Book, Inc. She holds an MA in American Studies from University of Massachusetts Boston and a BA in English from Harvard College.

Elisa Anais Garcia is the Supervising Librarian of MyLibraryNYC, Collections at The New York Public Library in partnership with the New York City Department of Education, The Brooklyn Public Library, and The Queens Public Library. She is motivated to foster a love of reading in reluctant readers and therefore strives to introduce them to a diverse world of experiences through books. 

Grace D. Gipson, Ph.D., is an Assistant Professor in the Department of African American Studies at Virginia Commonwealth University. As a Black future feminist/pop culture scholar, Dr. G's area of research interest centers on Black popular culture, digital humanities, representations of race and gender within comic books, Afrofuturism, and race and new media. Outside of the classroom, you can find Dr. G working in the community and on her social networks: Instagram- @lovejones20 and Twitter- @GBreezy20.

Ashley Leffel is the librarian in Frisco, TX.  Before becoming a librarian, she taught music for many years. She loves reading all types of books and fangirling for her favorite authors. When not reading, she enjoys Broadway musicals and can quote just about every episode of Bob’s Burgers.

Dr. Claudette S. McLinn

Alea Perez has been a Youth and Young Adult Services manager in the Chicago suburbs since June 2015. She aims to help children, teens, and their caregivers discover the many services libraries provide. Alea is dedicated to advocacy for youth and teen services, youth and teen services management, graphic novels for youth and teens, and equity and inclusion in the field at large. 

Ashley Rayner is a research librarian at NORC at the University of Chicago. She has been an academic and public librarian as well, all within the Chicagoland area. Ashley loves reading any genre but she has a special love for speculative fiction, historical fiction, and thrillers. She started writing book reviews for Booklist in 2020 and they help her stay connected to fiction as a librarian at a social science research organization. When she's not reading or researching, Ashley can be found playing video games, cooking, planning her next karaoke debut song, tweeting at @ashley_rayner, or hanging out with her husband and two kids.