Alicia D. Williams is the author of Mid-Air, which was longlisted for the National Book Award; Genesis Begins Again, which received Newbery and Kirkus Prize honors, the Coretta Scott King John Steptoe Award for New Talent, and was a William C. Morris Award finalist. Her picture book The Talk was also a Coretta Scott King Honor book. An oral storyteller in the African American tradition, she lives in Charlotte, North Carolina.