Five Author Questions (5AQ)

Hena Khan is an award-winning author of picture books and middle grade fiction. Her middle grade novel Amina’s Voice launched Simon & Schuster’s groundbreaking Salaam Reads imprint and was named a Best Book of 2017 by the Washington Post, NPR, Kirkus Reviews, and others. The sequel, Amina’s Song, won the 2021 Asian/Pacific Award for Children’s Literature. Hena wrote the popular Zayd Saleem Chasing the Dream series, and More to the Story, a novel inspired by her all-time favorite book, Lit...

Jen White is the author of Survival Strategies of the Almost Brave and A Thousand Minutes to Sunlight. She holds an M.F.A. in writing for children and young adults from Vermont College of Fine Arts. She lives in San Clemente, California, with her family.Jen has a degree in English teaching and also earned her MFA from Vermont College of Fine Arts in writing for children and young adults. Jen currently lives with her family and the cutest mini-aussiedoodle puppy you've ever seen.For more info ...

Samira Ahmed is the bestselling author of Love, Hate & Other Filters, Internment, Mad, Bad & Dangerous to Know, and Amira & Hamza: The War to Save the Worlds, as well as a Ms. Marvel comic book mini-series. Her poetry, essays, and short stories have appeared in numerous publications and anthologies including the New York Times, Take the Mic, Color Outside the Lines, Vampires Never Get Old and A Universe of Wishes.She was born in Bombay, India, and grew up in Batavia, I...

Travis Jonker is an elementary school librarian. Author of the picture books The Very Last Castle (illustrated by Mark Pett), and Blue Floats Away (illustrated by Grant Snider). I write about children's books at 100scopenotes.com, and co-host a podcast about children's books called The Yarn.For more info on Travis visit www.travisjonkerbooks.com. This episode was recorded on May 21, 2021.Follow on Instagram - @fiveauthorquestions Follow on Twitter - @5AQpodEmail 5AQ - [email protected]...

Sonya Bernard-Hollins is the founder and CEO of Season Press LLC. The media consulting firm was founded in 2010 after the acquisition of Community Voices, a bi-weekly community newspaper founded by Arlene and James Washington. The company has grown from providing a quarterly print and online magazine into a self-publishing company that has helped nearly 200 area authors see their dreams come true. Today, Bernard-Hollins has also published 7 of her own works that include historical children an...

Peter Mulvey has been a songwriter, road-dog, raconteur and almost-poet since before he can remember. Nineteen records, an illustrated book, thousands of live performances, a TEDx talk, a decades-long association with the National Youth Science Camp, opening for luminaries such as Ani DiFranco, Emmylou Harris, and Chuck Prophet, appearances on NPR, an annual autumn tour by bicycle, emceeing festivals, hosting his own boutique festival (the Lamplighter Sessions, in Boston and Wisconsin)… Mulve...

Betsy Bird (@FuseEight) is the Collection Development Manager of Evanston Public Library. In addition to running the School Library Journal blog about children's literature A Fuse #8 Production, Betsy reviews for Kirkus and has two podcasts about kids books. Betsy is the author of the picture books Giant Dance Party and The Great Santa Stakeout, editor of the middle grade Funny Girl, and her debut middle grade novel Long Way to the Circus illustrated by David Small is out this fall. www.betsy...

Caitlin Horrocks is author of the story collections Life Among the Terranauts and This Is Not Your City, both New York Times Book Review Editor’s Choice selections. Her novel The Vexations was named one of the Ten Best Books of 2019 by the Wall Street Journal. Her stories and essays appear in The New Yorker, The Best American Short Stories, The PEN/O. Henry Prize Stories, The Pushcart Prize, The Paris Review, Tin House, and One Story, as well as other journals and anthologies. Her awards incl...

Dr. Kat Williams is a Professor of Women’s Sport History at Marshall University, and is author of The All-American Girls After the AAGPBL: How Playing Pro Ball Shaped Their Lives, and Isabel Lefty Alvarez: The Improbable Life of a Cuban American Baseball Star. Through her teaching, scholarship and advocacy Kat has dedicated many years to the preservation of girls' and women’s baseball history. She continues that work as president and a founding member of the International Women’s Baseball Cen...

Katie Zhao is a 2017 graduate of the University of Michigan with a B.A. in English and Political Science, and a 2018 Masters of Accounting at the same university. She is the author of THE DRAGON WARRIOR series (Bloomsbury Kids), HOW WE FALL APART (Bloomsbury Kids), forthcoming LAST GAMER STANDING (Scholastic), and forthcoming WINNIE ZENG series (Random House Children’s Books). She is represented by Penny Moore of Aevitas Creative Management. She’s a passionate advocate for representation in l...