2015 Brackets with Judges Revealed!

Clare Vanderpool lives in Wichita, KS with her husband and four children.  As a huge fan of March Madness, she was thrilled to be asked to participate in SLJ’s Battle of the Books because it combines two of her favorite things:  brackets and books!  Clare has been a life-long reader who has been known to read in unlikely places:  dressing rooms, math class, long stoplights, church… oh, like you never.  Her first book, Moon Over Manifest won the 2011 Newbery Medal and Navigating Early was named a Printz Honor book.  Clare is diligently working on her next book and in case her editor is reading this, she is definitely not using Battle of the Books as a way to justify reading instead of writing.

Cat Winters was born and raised in Southern California, near Disneyland, which may explain her love of haunted mansions, bygone eras, and fantasylands. She received degrees in drama and English from the University of California, Irvine, and formerly worked in publishing. Her critically acclaimed debut novel, In the Shadow of Blackbirds, was named a 2014 Morris Award Finalist, a School Library Journal Best Book of 2013, a 2014 Best Fiction for Young Adults pick, and a 2013 Bram Stoker Award Nominee. Her second novel, The Cure for Dreaming, has been nominated for YALSA’s 2015 Best Fiction for Young Adults and the American Library Association’s 2015 Amelia Bloomer Project. Cat lives in Portland, Oregon, with her husband and two kids.

Elizabeth Wein is the highly opinionated author of Code Name Verity, which won the acclaimed Undead Vote in SLJ’s 2013 BoB. After Rose Under Fire’s ignominious BoB defeat in 2014, Elizabeth cunningly spent the year procrastinating to ensure she wouldn’t have a book eligible for combat in 2015. She is utterly delighted to be involved in the battle from the reviewer’s side, and looks forward to breaking her traditional politic authorly radio silence.