Leo Dillon and Diane Dillon were American illustrators of children's books and adult paperback book and magazine covers. One obituary of Leo called the work of the husband-and-wife team "a seamless amalgam of both their hands". In more than 50 years, they created more than 100 speculative fiction book and magazine covers together as well as much interior artwork. Essentially all of their work in that field was joint.
Virginia Esther Hamilton was an American children's books author. She wrote 41 books, including M. C. Higgins, the Great (1974), for which she won the U.S. National Book Award for Young People's Literature and the Newbery Medal in 1975. Her works were celebrated for exploring the African-American experience, what she called "Liberation Literature."
Sharon G. Flake is an American writer of children and young adult literature who lives in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
The Coretta Scott King Award is an annual award presented by the Coretta Scott King Book Award Round Table, part of the American Library Association (ALA). Named for Coretta Scott King, wife of Martin Luther King Jr., this award recognizes outstanding books for young adults and children by African Americans that reflect the African American experience. Awards are given both to authors and to illustrators for universal human values.
Jerry Pinkney was an American illustrator and writer of children's literature. Pinkney illustrated over 100 books since 1964, including picture books, nonfiction titles and novels. Pinkney's works addressed diverse themes and were usually done in watercolors.
Kadir Nelson is a Los Angeles–based painter, illustrator, and author who is best known for his paintings often featured on the covers of The New Yorker magazine, and album covers for Michael Jackson and Drake. His work is focused on African-American culture and history. The New York Times describes his work as: "sumptuous, deeply affecting work. Nelson’s paintings are drenched in ambience, and often overt symbolism. He has twice been a Caldecott honor recipient and won the 2020 Caldecott Medal for his illustrations in The Undefeated.
Sharon Mills Draper is an American children's writer, professional educator, and the 1997 National Teacher of the Year. She is a two-time winner of the Coretta Scott King Award for books about the young and adolescent African-American experience. She is known for her Hazelwood and Jericho series, Copper Sun,Double Dutch, Out of My Mind and Romiette and Julio.
Nikki Grimes is an American author of books written for children and young adults, as well as a poet and journalist.
Earl Bradley Lewis is an American artist and illustrator. He is best known for his watercolor illustrations for children's books such as Jacqueline Woodson’s The Other Side and Jabari Asim’s Preaching to the Chickens: The Story of Young John Lewis.
Bryan Collier is an American writer and illustrator known best for illustrating children's books. He won both the Coretta Scott King Award as an illustrator and the Ezra Jack Keats New Illustrator Award for Uptown, the first book he both wrote and illustrated. He has won six Coretta Scott King Awards as illustrator and he is a four-time Caldecott Honor recipient.
Marilyn Nelson is an American poet, translator, biographer, and children's book author. She is a professor emeritus at the University of Connecticut, and the former Poet Laureate of Connecticut. She is a winner of the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize, the NSK Neustadt Prize for Children’s Literature, and the Frost Medal. From 1978 to 1994, she published under the name Marilyn Nelson Waniek. She is the author or translator of more than twenty books and five chapbooks of poetry for adults and children. While most of her work deals with historical subjects, in 2014 she published a memoir, named one of NPR's Best Books of 2014, entitled How I Discovered Poetry.
Ashley Frederick Bryan was an American writer and illustrator of children's books. Most of his subjects are from the African-American experience. He was a U.S. nominee for the Hans Christian Andersen Award in 2006 and he won the Children's Literature Legacy Award for his contribution to American children's literature in 2009. His picture book Freedom Over Me was short-listed for the 2016 Kirkus Prize and received a Newbery Honor.
Eloise Greenfield was an American children's book and biography author and poet famous for her descriptive, rhythmic style and positive portrayal of the African-American experience.
Denene Millner is an American author, editor, television and podcast host, and journalist. She has authored more than 30 books, including six New York Times best sellers. She is the creator and director of Denene Millner Books, an imprint of Simon & Schuster, and MyBrownBaby.com, a critically acclaimed blog that examines the intersection of parenting and race.
Mildred DeLois Taylor is a Newbery Award-winning American young adult novelist. She is best known for her novel Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry, part of her Logan family series.
Fredrick Lemuel "Fred" McKissack, Sr. was an American writer, best known for collaborating with his wife, Patricia C. McKissack, on more than 100 children's books about the history of African-Americans.
The Dark-Thirty: Southern Tales of the Supernatural, is a children's thriller book, filled with ten tales of supernatural activity occurring throughout times of slavery and civil rights in the south. The authors of the book, Patricia McKissack and Fredrick McKissack, husband and wife, are known for their writings about African American culture. The illustrator of this book is Brian Pinkney, who has illustrated many highly acclaimed children's picture books. The Dark Thirty: Southern Tales of the Supernatural was published in 1992 and received a Newbery Honor along with a Coretta Scott King Award in 1993.
Minty: A Story of Young Harriet Tubman is a 1996 children's picture book by Alan Schroeder and is illustrated by Jerry Pinkney. Released in 1996 by Dial Press, it is a fictionalized story of Harriet Tubman as a young girl.
Carole Marie Byard was an American visual artist, illustrator, and photographer. She was an award-winning illustrator of children's books, and the recipient of a Caldecott Honor, as well as multiple Coretta Scott King Awards.
Brian Pinkney is an American illustrator.
