Young Adult Presenters
These presenters will be in area schools on Friday of the Festival and general sessions throughout the weekend.
More presenters will be confirmed in the days and weeks ahead.
Nick Brooks
Nick Brooks is an award-winning author, filmmaker, and musician from Washington, DC. His first YA novel, Promise Boys, debuted in January 2023 and was the largest publishing deal for a Young Adult debut in history. The book received critical acclaim, including winning the Odyssey Award and being a 2023 Boston Globe-Horn Book Award honoree. His second YA novel, Up In Smoke, was released in May 2025. Before becoming a full-time artist, Brooks was an educator working primarily with at-risk youth while earning his M. Ed. in Curriculum & Instruction.
-
A girl determined to clear her brother's name. A boy determined to keep his out of the line of fire. A secret smoldering between them. This edge-of-your-seat mystery from the author of Promise Boys is perfect for fans of Karen McManus and The Hate U Give.
Unmask a murderer or take the fall.
After Cooper King is pressured by big brother figure Jason to go on a looting spree during a local march, the unthinkable happens: gunshots ring in the air and someone ends up dead. After Cooper flees, the news shows four teens in ski masks near the scene of the murder—Cooper and his friends. Cooper fears the cops will come knocking at his door, and the pressure only mounts when a suspect is taken into custody: Jason.
Monique, Jason's sister and Cooper's longtime crush, is willing to go any length to clear her brother's name. Even if she needs to go into the belly of the beast and confront the killer herself. When she teams up with Cooper, they fall down the investigation rabbit hole and start to fall for each other. But little does Monique know that within this web of deception, Cooper is shrouding the truth that he was there when the shots went off. If the pair fail to uncover the real murderer, Jason will get locked up for a crime he didn't commit—and drag down Cooper with him.
Candace Fleming
Photo Credit: Eric Rohmann
Candace Fleming is the prolific and versatile award-winning author of many books for children and young adults. School Library Journal praised her most recent title, Murder Among Friends, which received four-starred reviews, as a "chilling page-turner." Her previous book, The Rise and Fall of Charles Lindbergh, received six-starred reviews, was a Kirkus, PW, Booklist, and SLJ Best Book of the Year, and was hailed by the Wall Street Journal as a “fascinating chronicle.” Fleming’s The Family Romanov also received six-starred reviews, won the Boston Globe-Horn Book Award for Nonfiction and the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, and was recognized as a Sibert Nonfiction Honor Book. Her many acclaimed picture books include Giant Squid, a Sibert Honor Book.
-
How did Jim Jones, the leader of Peoples Temple, convince more than 900 of his followers to commit “revolutionary suicide” by drinking cyanide-laced punch? From a master of narrative nonfiction comes a chilling chronicle of one of the most notorious cults in American history.
Using riveting first-person accounts, award-winning author Candace Fleming reveals the makings of a monster: from Jones’s humble origins as a child of the Depression… to his founding of a group whose idealistic promises of equality and justice attracted thousands of followers… to his relocation of Temple headquarters from California to an unsettled territory in Guyana, South America, which he dubbed “Jonestown”… to his transformation of Peoples Temple into a nefarious experiment in mind-control.
And Fleming heart-stoppingly depicts Jones’s final act, persuading his followers to swallow fatal doses of cyanide—to “drink the kool-aid,” as it became known—as a test of their ultimate devotion.
Here is a sweeping story that traces, step by step, the ways in which one man slowly indoctrinated, then murdered, 900 innocent, well- meaning people. And how a few members, Jones’ own son included, stood up to him… but not before it was too late.
Andrea Hannah
Andrea Hannah is the author of nonfiction and fiction novels for young adults. She teaches creatives all over the globe and writes everything from fierce modern fairy tales to horoscopes (she’s a Gemini). Her work has appeared in Bustle, Elite Daily, Reader's Digest, Thrive Global, HuffPost, Mslexia magazine, and more. You can find her on socials: @andeehannah.
-
One of Us Is Lying meets Knives Out—with beasts, murder, and magic—in this first book in a thrilling locked-room whodunnit YA fantasy duology by Andrea Hannah and New York Times bestseller Rebecca Mix.
After a decade of war, the kingdoms of Avendell and Istellia have finally agreed to peace. As nobles and magic wielders from both countries arrive at remote Castle Avendell for a historic all-night masquerade to celebrate, King Costis summons an unlikely group to his chambers: the crown prince, his Istellian bride-to-be, his personal guard, a wild beast tamer, and the palace’s questionable new healer. But before Costis can reveal why he has gathered them, the castle goes dark.
When the lights come back, the king is dead—murdered with the princess’s knife, in a weak spot only his guard knew of, and with venom from one of the beast tamer’s monsters lacing the blade.
With no clear killer—and everyone a suspect—they make a risky pact: Tell no one until the treaty is signed. But when a winter storm seals everyone inside and someone aware of the king's untimely death begins to pick off guests one by one, the six suspects must work together to discover who killed the king . . . before one of them is next.
Rebecca Mix
Rebecca Mix is a New York Times and indie best-selling author of stories about messy girls, eerie magic, and hope. She spent her childhood tromping through swamps and falling out of very tall trees—which, in hindsight, explains a lot. A reluctant reader at first, she fell in love with books after joining a reading contest to spite her fourth-grade nemesis.
-
One of Us Is Lying meets Knives Out—with beasts, murder, and magic—in this first book in a thrilling locked-room whodunnit YA fantasy duology by Andrea Hannah and New York Times bestseller Rebecca Mix.
After a decade of war, the kingdoms of Avendell and Istellia have finally agreed to peace. As nobles and magic wielders from both countries arrive at remote Castle Avendell for a historic all-night masquerade to celebrate, King Costis summons an unlikely group to his chambers: the crown prince, his Istellian bride-to-be, his personal guard, a wild beast tamer, and the palace’s questionable new healer. But before Costis can reveal why he has gathered them, the castle goes dark.
When the lights come back, the king is dead—murdered with the princess’s knife, in a weak spot only his guard knew of, and with venom from one of the beast tamer’s monsters lacing the blade.
With no clear killer—and everyone a suspect—they make a risky pact: Tell no one until the treaty is signed. But when a winter storm seals everyone inside and someone aware of the king's untimely death begins to pick off guests one by one, the six suspects must work together to discover who killed the king . . . before one of them is next.
Maggie Stiefvater
Photo Credit: Stephen Voss
Maggie Stiefvater is the New York Times bestselling author of the Shiver trilogy, The Raven Cycle, and The Scorpio Races, among dozens of other YA fantasy novels. Her latest books are The Listeners, her adult debut, and a graphic novel adaptation of The Raven Boys, both hitting shelves in 2025. Steifvater’s books have sold over five million copies around the world, and she lives in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia with her husband and their two children.
Maggie will not be able to participate in the school visits on Friday, but will be
in general sessions for both her YA and Adult Fiction throughout the weekend.
-
The first book in Maggie Stiefvater’s #1 NYT bestselling series The Raven Cycle, now gorgeously illustrated as a graphic novel!
Blue Sargent comes from a family of psychics. Only, she has never had the same clairvoyant abilities they had and has always felt too ordinary within the magic that surrounded her. Enter Gansey, a rich student from Aglionby, the town’s all-boys private school teeming with wealth, privilege, and trouble. Blue’s always made it a point to stay away from its students, the Raven Boys.
But when Gansey asks her to join him and three other Raven Boys on his quest to find a long-forgotten Welsh king rumored to be sleeping beneath the mountains of their quiet Virginia town, Blue doesn’t hesitate. She jumps at the chance to finally be a part of something real and full of magic, a world she was born into yet one that always stood just out of reach. Soon enough, she’s swept into a strange and shifting world woven into theirs, one far more dangerous than anything they could have dreamt up.
Now reimagined as a stunning full-color graphic novel adapted by Stephanie Williams and illustrated by Sas Milledge, The Raven Boys unravels a thrilling plot around a cast of characters impossible to forget.
Kennedy Tarrell
Kennedy Tarrell (she/they) likes to write and illustrate dark comedies, overt therapy analogies, and general spooky stuff. Aside from that, they work as a story artist and animation writer, across studios such as Walt Disney Animation Studios, Netflix, Cartoon Network, DreamWorks, and Warner Bros. Aside from that, she spends her time with her dog, Lenny; manages way too many DnD groups; and sneaks coffees into libraries across Los Angeles.
-
A disillusioned teen dreams of fame and villainy in this hilarious and heartfelt young adult fantasy graphic novel from debut author/illustrator Kennedy Tarrell.
Hawthorne Vandercast has big plans: join the infamous Brigade of Shade, move into a glamorous castle, and leave their mundane life as a potion barista behind. But when they finally get the chance to join the Brigade, Hawthorne finds themselves overshadowed by Maple, a bubbly, bright, flowery girl who could not look further from evil. After an accident ends in death, Hawthorne is suddenly tasked with leading the Brigade. They soon begin to realize that maybe villainy isn't actually all it's cracked up to be.
Evil-ish spins the classic trope of good versus evil on its head in a hilarious and tender story about a teenager who feels bigger than their job, their town, and their circumstances . . . and finds out that what they thought they wanted might not be what they actually needed.