Jennifer Donnelly is an American writer best known for the young adult historical novel A Northern Light.

A Northern Light was published as A Gathering Light in the U.K. There, it won the 2003 Carnegie Medal, recognizing the year's outstanding children's book. For the 70th anniversary of the Medal a few years later, it was named one of the top ten winning works, selected by a panel to compose the ballot for a public election of the all-time favorite. Similarly, it was named one of Time Magazine's 100 Best Young Adult Books of All Time in 2015.

Jennifer Donnelly is the author of thirteen novels - Poisoned, Stepsister, Lost in a Book, These Shallow Graves, Sea Spell, Dark Tide, Rogue Wave, Deep Blue, Revolution, A Northern Light, The Tea Rose, The Winter Rose, and The Wild Rose - and Humble Pie, a picture book for children. She is a co-author of Fatal Throne, which explores the lives of King Henry VIII's six wives, for which she wrote the part of Anna of Cleves, Henry's fourth wife.

In 2023, she published Molly's Letter, the first in a series of novella-length stories called Rose Petals set in the world of her three-volume Tea Rose series.

Jennifer grew up in New York State, in Lewis and Westchester counties, and attended the University of Rochester where she majored in English Literature.