Meredith Russo | |
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![]() Meredith Russo | |
Occupation | Author |
Years active | 2016–present |
Notable work | If I Was Your Girl |
Awards | Stonewall Book Award 2017 |
Meredith Russo (born circa 1986/1987) [1] is an American young adult author from Chattanooga, Tennessee.
Russo is a transgender woman who transitioned in late 2013. [2] Her debut young adult novel If I Was Your Girl is the first widely distributed young adult book about transgender teens written by a transgender woman. It was inspired by Russo's life events. [3] She wanted to write a book about a transgender character with a happy ending. In addition to her literary efforts, she campaigns heavily for HIV awareness and de-stigmatization. [4]
Russo's debut young adult novel, If I Was Your Girl, published in 2016 by Flatiron Books. [5] If I Was Your Girl is about a trans girl going to a new school and falling in love with a boy. [6] If I Was Your Girl won the Stonewall Book Award for the Young Adult category in 2017 [7] and the Walter Dean Myers Award for Outstanding Children's Literature in 2017. [8] It also received a starred review from Kirkus Reviews, [9] Publishers Weekly, [10] and Booklist. [11]
Her next young adult novel, Birthday, was published by Flatiron Books in 2019 and is a follow-up to her award-winning debut If I Was Your Girl, following two teenagers whose lives intersect starting from both their 13th birthdays. [12]
Russo also contributed several short stories and essays to anthologies published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, [13] Vintage, [14] and Algonquin. [15]
The different characters of her stories are based on people she met during her life or from her own personal experience. [16]
In an interview, she said that she has been inspired by a lot of comics, manga [17] as well as fictions [18]