Yamile (sha-MEE-lay) Saied Méndez is the author of many books for young readers and adults, including Furia, a Reese’s YA Book Club selection and the inaugural Pura Belpré Young Adult Gold Medalist in 2021. Her books have received many accolades such as the Junior Library Guild Gold Standard, Whitney Award, Cybils Award, Américas Award, and Bank Street Spanish Language Book Awards, among others. They have also been featured in the best of year lists of the New York City Public Library, Salt Lake Public Library, Kirkus Reviews, Publishers Weekly, and those of many states. She was born and raised in Rosario, Argentina, but has lived most of her life in a lovely valley surrounded by mountains in Utah. An inaugural Walter Dean Myers Grant recipient, she’s also a graduate of Voices of Our Nations Foundation (VONA) and the Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA Writing for Children’s and Young Adult program. Yamile is also a founding member of Las Musas, the first collective of nonbinary Latine authors. She taught herself English with a Spanish-English dictionary, and now has been faculty at Tin House Workshop and a keynote speaker at The Vermont College of Fine Arts. Find out more at YamileMendez.com.