Christina Mandelski has loved putting pen to paper for as long as she can remember. After years of dabbling in various genres (riveting poetry in kindergarten, then again in college, with clandestine notes in grade school and yearbook copy in high school in between), she eventually found her passion writing for kids. Her debut novel for teens, The Icing on the Cake, will soon be published by Egmont USA. She lives with her family in Houston. {site}

Novelist and poet Angela Morrison grew up on the wheat farm in Washington where her debut teen romance, Taken by Storm (Penguin/Razorbill 2009), is set. A graduate of Brigham Young University, she holds an MFA in Writing for Children and Young Adults from Vermont College. Her second novel for Razorbill, Sing me to Sleep, releases March 2010. After more than a decade abroad, in Canada, Switzerland, and Singapore, her family is now settled in Mesa, Arizona.

Erin Byers Murray is a Boston area journalist, specializing in food and wine writing. Most recently, she was the editor for Boston DailyCandy.com. Her work has been published in the Boston Globe, Food and Wine, and in many other print and online venues. She now spends her days in hip waders, harvesting oysters with the crew at Island Creek Oysters. Her memoir, Shucked: My Year in Oysters, will be published by St. Martin's Press in 2011. {site}

Matt has been drawing ever since he could first hold a pencil, and super heroes have filled up the majority of the pages in his sketchbooks. That lifelong love of comic books spurred him to write Jack Blank, which will debut from Simon and Schuster in 2010. Matt works for mtvU and lives in New Jersey with his wife, son, and their trusty dog Indy. {site}

Elisa Nader’s career has taken her from owning her own record label and playing in rock bands to designing websites for companies like Time Warner and AOL, but her passion was always writing. After ditching her soul-sucking corporate gig in 2008, she became obsessed with writing a young adult novel much to the dismay of her family and friends. (Not surprisingly, the novel is about playing in rock bands and a sort of literal soul-sucking.) She lives outside of Washington D.C. with her husband, daughter, an old bass guitar and an even older cat. {site}

Deesha Philyaw and Michael D. Thomas are devoted co-parents and the founders of Co-Parenting101.org, an online resource for those who are parenting together after a divorce or separation. They also co-host Co-Parenting Matters, a weekly live radio talk show on BlogTalk Radio. Visit them on the web at Co-Parenting 101. {site}

Sarah Ockler is the author of the acclaimed debut Twenty Boy Summer, which was published in 2009, and the forthcoming Fixing Delilah, both from Little, Brown Books for Young Readers. When she’s not busy making up stories, Sarah blogs, snaps photographs, and embarks on whirlwind adventures with her husband. They live in Buffalo, NY, where they survive the long winters thanks to coffee and Indian food and big fuzzy slippers. {site}

Edith Pattou is the New York Times–bestselling author of Mrs. Spitzer’s Garden, a picture book, and the beloved fantasy East, an ALA Notable Book and Top Ten BBYA selection, as well as the two novels in the ongoing Songs of Eirren, Hero’s Song and Fire Arrow. Her latest novel, Fainting Goats, is forthcoming from Beach Lane Books/Simon & Schuster. She lives and writes in Columbus, Ohio.{site}

Rinsai Rossetti was born in Thailand; she grew up in Canada, Italy, and the United Arab Emirates. She is currently a student at Dartmouth College. She has been an avid writer her entire life, and loves telling stories that meld elements of the fantastic with the utterly normal. Her debut novel will appear from Dial Books for Young Readers in 2012.