Holly Black

Holly Black (born 10 November 1971) is an American writer of fantasy for children and young adults, best known as co-creator of The Spiderwick Chronicles and author of the Folk of the Air trilogy that began with The Cruel Prince. She was born Holly Riggenbach in West Long Branch, New Jersey.

Her first novel, Tithe: A Modern Faerie Tale, was published by Simon & Schuster in 2002, and was followed by two companion books, Valiant (2005), which won the Andre Norton Award, and Ironside (2007). With Tony DiTerlizzi she created The Spiderwick Chronicles, whose first two books, The Field Guide and The Seeing Stone, appeared together in May 2003; the series was filmed in 2008.

Later work includes the Curse Workers trilogy, opening with White Cat (2010), Doll Bones (2013), a Newbery Honor book and Mythopoeic Award winner, The Coldest Girl in Coldtown (2013) and The Darkest Part of the Forest (2015). With Cassandra Clare she wrote the five-book Magisterium series, beginning with The Iron Trial (Scholastic, 2014). The Cruel Prince was published by Little, Brown Books for Young Readers on 2 January 2018, followed by The Wicked King and The Queen of Nothing (both 2019). Her first adult novel, Book of Night, came from Tor in 2022.

For collectors, the key early book is Tithe (Simon & Schuster, 2002), her debut, followed by the first two Spiderwick books (Simon & Schuster, May 2003). The Cruel Prince (Little, Brown, 2018) entered the New York Times bestseller list on publication and opened a sequence that later grew to include The Stolen Heir (2023) and The Prisoner's Throne (2024).