Kelly J. Baptist is the inaugural winner of the We Need Diverse Books short-story contest. Her story is featured in the WNDB anthology Flying Lessons & Other Stories and inspired her first full-length novel, Isaiah Dunn Is My Hero, which received starred reviews from Booklist and Publishers Weekly, and which the New York Times praised as “inventive and heartfelt,” and its sequel, Isaiah Dunn Saves the Day. Her middle-grade novel The Swag Is in the Socks received starred reviews from The Bulletin and Booklist, which called it “an excellent read-alike to Jacqueline Woodson’s Harbor Me or Janae Marks’ From the Desk of Zoe Washington.” Kelly is also the author of the picture book The Electric Slide and Kai and the middle-grade novel in verse Eb & Flow. Kelly lives in southwest Michigan with her five amazing children.
