Author Profiles
Ohio has a rich literary heritage as well as some wonderful contemporary authors. Learn more about them here! You can sort by various categories and see who has participated in our annual book festival by using the category search on the left, or search by keyword (including partial author names) by using the search field on the right.
- You are searching within category(ies): Young Adult
Sally Derby
Sally Derby is the author of numerous children’s books. The inspiration for No Mush Today came from a young girl at Derby’s church, and from her own childhood dislike of cornmeal mush. Derby and her husband live in Cincinnati, Ohio. She is the winner of the 2017 Juvenile/Middle Grade Ohioana Book Award for Jump Back, Paul.
Julie Drew
Julie Drew is an Ohio-based writer and English professor who has published seven books, multiple academic and national media articles, as well as new fiction reviews. In addition to teaching creative writing at the graduate and undergraduate levels, she has offered writing workshops in the Midwest and New England.
Julie earned a BA in Creative Writing, MA in English literature, and PhD in Rhetoric and Writing from the University of South Florida. She is currently a Professor of English at The University of Akron where she teaches creative writing, cultural studies, and women & film.
Her most recent work, The Tesla Effect trilogy, is a young adult series comprised of Glimpse (2014), Run (2014), and Breathe (June 2015). The first two books in the trilogy were included on Ohio.com’s list of Memorable Books of 2014.
Julie’s novels have been reviewed in Publishers Weekly, Library Journal (her novel Daughter of Providence received a coveted Red Star Review), Kirkus, Booklist, Historical Novels Review (where Daughter of Providence received an Editor’s Choice designation), Cleveland Plain Dealer, Providence Journal, and Akron Beacon Journal.
Having grown up in Florida and then lived in Ohio for more than a decade, Julie and her husband now happily spend part of every year near the ocean in Rhode Island. She loves dogs, loves to travel and hike, is an amateur foodie and unabashed TV enthusiast, and enjoys outdoorsy volunteer work in the Cuyahoga Valley National Park. Visit her at http://www.juliedrew.com.
Martha Dunsky
Martha Dunsky (pen name for Martha Caprarotta) grew up writing and drawing stories with her nine siblings. Her debut book, “Fire and Forgiveness: A Nun’s Truce with General Sherman,” is illustrated by her sister Monica Wyrick. A member of the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators and graduate of the University of Dayton, Martha is a former award-winning TV reporter/videographer and producer, and retired technical editor for the National Air and Space Intelligence Center. Born and raised in Dayton, Ohio, she resides near Dayton with her husband and five cats. Martha loves delving into history and finding inspirational true stories.
R.C. Durkee
R.C. Durkee is both a writer and an artist who blends her love of history, nature and the rural life into her creative projects. The sixth generation to have lived on the family’s 182 year old farm, she has raised horses, sheep, cows and crops. She is also an avid gardener.
An award winning artist, her artwork has appeared on magazine covers, in art books and in art galleries in Ohio and beyond. She has written and published short stories and essays for over twenty-five years, and her debut novel, published in 2014, is the historical fiction, RUM RUN set during 1920’s Prohibition. It has received many rave reviews including Midwest Book Review, the Historical Novel Society and the Great Lakes Historical Society. She painted the book’s dramatic cover design at the suggestion of her publisher.
RUM RUN was selected to participate in the 2015 Ohioana Book Festival in Columbus, Ohio where she participated in a panel discussion on historical fiction and attended a reception at the governor’s residence. She has done many programs on her novel and Lake Erie Prohibition history at libraries, societies and continuing education courses as well as book and writing club talks.
Her interests are historical places and buildings, classics cars, hiking and biking and star- gazing. She particularly enjoys studying 17th though early 20th Century American history and visiting related sites with her husband who shares her interest in the the Civil War. For more information about Durkee, go to her website at rcdurkee.com.
Federico Erebia
Federico Erebia is a retired physician, woodworker, author, poet, and illustrator. He received a BA from the College of Wooster, and an MD from Brown University. He will receive the 2024 Lambda Literary Award for Exceptional New Writer. Other distinctions for his debut novel, Pedro & Daniel (Levine Querido 2023) include: 2024 Ohioana Book Award, finalist; 2024 Massachusetts Book Award, longlist; 2024 Américas Book Award, Commended Title; 2024 Bank Street BEST BOOK; 2023 Kirkus BEST BOOK; and starred reviews from Kirkus, Publishers Weekly, and Shelf Awareness. He and his husband live near Boston, Massachusetts. https://fjebooks.com/index.html
Donna Farland-Smith
Donna Farland-Smith is an Associate Professor of Science Education in The School of Teaching & Learning at The Ohio State University. Her research that focuses on students’ perceptions and attitudes toward science and scientists as well as the characteristics of scientists that most positively affect the girl’s perception of scientists. She has over a decade’s experience in the classroom and previously taught science all grades K-12. She is co-author of two books for teachers through NSTA Press, Eureka! Science Alive through Scientists’ Stories and Intermediate Science Activities and Eureka! Science Alive through Scientists’ Stories and Primary Science Activities.
Polly Farquar
Ellen Fritz
Ellen Fritz is a retired teacher and high school counselor. Over the years of teaching reading and English to students in grades seven through twelve before becoming a counselor, she had the great opportunity to discuss numerous favorite books with students and also took their recommendations for her own reading.
She finally found herself with the time to give life to the stories that have always been patiently waiting in her head for an audience. Ellen wrote Mira to appeal to those middle grade/teen readers that she found so inspiring through her career as an educator.
Dee Garretson
Dee writes middle grade, young adult and adult fiction under her own name and also writes for the Boxcar Children series under the original author’s name. She lives in Cincinnati, Ohio with her family in a book-cluttered house surrounded by a semi-wild garden. Her two cats Piper and Poppy are her writing companions and the stars of Skype visits with book clubs. When Dee is not writing or reading, she is most likely watching old movies, cooking treats to go along with book reading or trying to learn to make jewelry.
Geoffrey Girard
Geoffrey Girard writes thrillers, historicals, dark fantasy, young adult novels, and short speculative fiction for publications including Writers of the Future and the Stoker-nominated Dark Faith anthology. Born in Germany and shaped in New Jersey, Geoffrey graduated from Washington College with a literature degree and worked as an advertising copywriter before shifting to high school English teacher.…
Read MoreGeoffrey Girard writes thrillers, historicals, dark fantasy, young adult novels, and short speculative fiction for publications including Writers of the Future and the Stoker-nominated Dark Faith anthology. Born in Germany and shaped in New Jersey, Geoffrey graduated from Washington College with a literature degree and worked as an advertising copywriter before shifting to high school English teacher. He’s since earned an MA in Creative Writing from Miami University and is the Department Chair of English at a private boys’ school in Cincinnati. Simon and Schuster published two Girard novels in 2013: Cain’s Blood, a techno thriller, and Project Cain, a spinoff novel for young adult readers. For more information, visit http://www.GeoffreyGirard.com.