Holly Black is an American writer and editor best known for her children's and young adult fiction. Her most recent work is the New York Times bestselling young adult Folk of the Air series. She is also well known for The Spiderwick Chronicles, a series of children's fantasy books she created with writer and illustrator Tony DiTerlizzi, and her debut trilogy of young adult novels officially called the Modern Faerie Tales. Black has won a Nebula Award and a Newbery Honor. The Spiderwick Chronicles was adapted into a 2008 film and into a 2023 television series, for which Black received a nomination for the Children's and Family Emmy Award for Outstanding Young Teen Series.

Holly Black is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of over thirty fantasy novels for kids and teens. She has been a finalist for an Eisner Award and the Lodestar Award, and the recipient of the Mythopoeic Award, a Nebula, and a Newbery Honor. Her books have been translated into 32 languages worldwide and adapted for film. She currently lives in New England with her husband and son in a house with a secret library.

Holly Black grew up in New Jersey and loved reading and writing from an early age. Her first book, Tithe: A Modern Faerie Tale, was published in 2002. Tithe was called “dark, edgy, beautifully written and compulsively readable” by Booklist and was included in the American Library Association’s Best Books for Young Adults. She published a companion book, Valiant (2005), which was the recipient of a Nebula Award (formerly the Andre Norton Award), and a sequel, Ironside (2007), which spent five weeks on the New York Times bestseller list.

Holly collaborated with her long-time friend, Caldecott-award-winning artist, Tony DiTerlizzi, to create the bestselling Spiderwick Chronicles. The first two books, The Field Guide and The Seeing Stone were released together in 2003, with the next three, Lucinda’s Secret (2003), The Ironwood Tree (2004) and The Wrath of Mulgarath (2004), following in rapid succession. The Wrath of Mulgarath climbed to #1 on the New York Times bestseller list. The five-book serial has been called “vintage Victorian fantasy” by the New York Post and Time Magazine reported that “the books wallow in their dusty Olde Worlde charm.” The lavishly illustrated Arthur Spiderwick’s Field Guide to The Fantastical World Around You (2005), The Notebook for Fantastical Observations (2005), and Care and Feeding of Sprites (2006) expanded the Spiderwick universe. To date, the books have been translated into 32 languages.

Holly has also been a frequent contributor to anthologies and has co-edited three of them: Geektastic (with Cecil Castellucci, 2009), Zombies vs. Unicorns (with Justine Larbalestier, 2010), and Welcome to Bordertown (with Ellen Kushner, 2011). Her first collection of short fiction, Poison Eaters and Other Stories, came out in 2010 from Small Beer Press. She has also done some comics work. She wrote an Eisner-nominated graphic novel series, The Good Neighbors (Kith in 2008, Kin in 2009, and Kind in 2010) and a year of Lucifer comics for DC Comics in 2015.

She returned to novels with The Curse Workers series, a trilogy set in a world of capers, curse magic, and organized crime. The three books in the series were The White Cat (2010), The Red Glove (2011), and The Black Heart (2012). 2013 saw the release of two stand-alone novels. Doll Bones, a Newbery honor recipient and Mythopoeic award winner which marked a return to middle grade fiction, tells the story of three friends who go on a road trip to bury a haunted doll.

During this period, she also collaborated on a five-book middle grade fantasy series, Magisterium, with friend and fellow author Cassandra Clare. The series includes The Iron Trial (2014), The Copper Gauntlet (2015), The Bronze Key (2016), The Silver Mask (2017), and The Golden Tower (2018). The Darkest Part of the Forest (2015), a stand-alone novel, marked her return to faerie fiction. She followed that up with her Folk of the Air series. The first book, The Cruel Prince (2018), debuted on The New York Times bestseller list and remained on the list for four weeks.

In 2019, she also published a middle grade novel featuring Disney’s Maleficent, entitled The Heart of the Moors.

Holly lives in New England with her husband, son, and cats, in a house with a secret library.