Bio – Kami Garcia

SHORT BIO

Kami Garcia a #1 New York Times, USA Today and international bestselling author and comic book writer. As an award-winning, Bram Stoker Award-nominated young adult author of 12 novels and graphic novels, she has been published in 51 countries and 38 languages and her books have sold more than 10 million copies worldwide. Kami’s best known works include the Beautiful Creatures series, Teen Titans: Raven, The X-Files: Agent of Chaos, The Lovely Reckless, Broken Beautiful Hearts, and the DC Black Label comic Joker/Harley: Criminal Sanity. She is also a cofounder of the Kid Lit book festival YALLFest and co-organizer of #Creators4Comics. Learn more about Kami at kamigarcia.com and follow her on Instagram and Twitter @kamigarcia.

THE EXTENDED VERSION / FULL BIO

Kami Garcia is a #1 New York Times, USA Today, and international bestselling author. She is the coauthor of the BEAUTIFUL CREATURES and DANGEROUS CREATURES series and the author of five solo novels, including her Bram Stoker Award-nominated novels Unbreakable and Unmarked (THE LEGION series) and The X-Files Origins: Agent of Chaos. Kami’s first graphic novel Teen Titans: Raven, with artist Gabriel Picolo, is the first book in her TEEN TITANS series for DC Comics and her forthcoming adult series JOKER/HARLEY: CRIMINAL SANITY, from DC Black Label, releases Oct. 2019.

BEAUTIFUL CREATURES has been published in 51 countries and translated in 37 languages, and the series has over 10 million copies in print. Beautiful Creatures was a finalist for the ALA’s William C. Morris Debut Author Award, a SCIBA Award Finalist, Amazon’s #1 Teen Book of 2009, and #5 on the Editor’s Top 100 List, a YALSA “Teen Top Ten” Pick, and a New York Public Library’s “Books for the Teen Age” selection. The film adaptation Beautiful Creatures released in theaters in 2013, from Warner Brothers.

Kami co-founded YALLFEST (with Margaret Stohl and Jonathan Sanchez, owner of Blue Bicycle Books), the biggest teen book festival in the country, held annually in Charleston, SC. She is a board member of YALLFEST and YALLWEST, the sister festival in Santa Monica, CA. She is the YALLWEST Purple Ink Award Committee Chair, an award established in her honor to fund classroom libraries in underfunded Los Angeles schools. Kami volunteers her time with the non-profit groups WriteGirl, a creative writing and mentoring organization for girls that awarded her a 2012 Bold Ink Award; National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) as a member of the Writers Board; and Gilda’s Club, as a judge for their annual teen writing competition.

Kami has an MA in education, and she was a teacher for seventeen years before co-authoring her first novel on a dare from seven of her students. If she isn’t busy watching Supernatural, Kami can teach you how to escape from a pair of handcuffs or bake a Coca-Cola cake. She has never raced a car, but there is still time. She lives in Maryland with her family, and their dogs Spike and Oz (named after characters from Buffy the Vampire Slayer).

Visit Kami at www.kamigarcia.com, on Facebook @KamiGarciaYA, and on Twitter and Instagram @KamiGarcia.

PROFESSIONAL AFFILIATIONS & MEMBERSHIPS

Co-founder of YALLFEST Book Festival in Charleston, SC (with BEAUTIFUL CREATURES coauthor Margaret Stohl & Jonathan Sanchez of Blue Bicycle Books) and YALLFEST Board Member
Board Member of YALLWEST Book Festival in Santa Monica, CA & Committee Chair of the YALLWEST Purple Ink Award
Romantic Times Booklovers Convention (RT) Young Adult Programming Captain
Member of the National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) Writers Board
Professional Memberships: PEN Center USA, The Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators (SCBWI), Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America (SFWA), & the Horror Writers Association (HWA)

BOOK FESTIVAL, CONVENTION, AND LIBRARY CONFERENCE APPEARANCES

YALLFEST Book Festival (Co-founder and Board Member), YALLWEST Book Festival (Board Member), Los Angeles Times Festival of Books (LATFoB), the Paris Book Fair, Roma Cinemafest in Rome, Book Expo America (BEA), BookCon, San Diego Comic-Con, New York Comic-Con, American Library Association (ALA) Annual Conference and Children’s Institute, Texas Library Association (TLA) Annual Conference, Keynote at the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators (SCBWI) Conference, Miami Book Festival International, Wondercon, Romantic Times Booklovers Convention (RT), Texas Book Festival, Austin Teen Book Festival, Keynote at the Southern Independent Booksellers Association (SIBA) Conference, Decatur Book Festival, Baltimore Book Festival, Guest of Honor at the World Horror Convention, Keynote at the Books in the Basin Book Festival, Keynote at Pennwriters Annual Conference, Austin Bookfest, Apollycon, Smart Chicks Kick It Tour, Faeriecon, Orange County Children’s Book Festival, and Southern Festival of Books