14 Young Adult short stories from bestselling and award-winning authors make a splash in Mermaids Never Drown - the second collection in the Untold Legends series edited by Zoraida Córdova and Natalie C. Parker - exploring mermaids like we've never seen them before!
A Vietnamese mermaid caught between two worlds. A siren who falls for Poseidon's son. A boy secretly pining for the merboy who saved him years ago. A storm that brings humans and mermaids together. Generations of family secrets and pain.
Find all these stories and more in this gripping new collection that will reel you in from the very first page! Welcome to an ocean of hurt, fear, confusion, rage, hope, humor, discovery, and love in its many forms.
Edited by Zoraida Córdova and Natalie C. Parker, Mermaids Never Drown features beloved authors like Darcie Little Badger, Kalynn Bayron, Preeti Chhibber, Rebecca Coffindaffer, Julie C. Dao, Maggie Tokuda-Hall, Adriana Herrera, June Hur, Katherine Locke, Kerri Maniscalco, Julie Murphy, Gretchen Schreiber, and Julian Winters.
Zoraida Córdova is the acclaimed author of more than two dozen novels and short stories, including the Brooklyn Brujas series, Star Wars: The High Republic: Convergence, and The Inheritance of Orquídea Divina. In addition to writing novels, she serves on the board of We Need Diverse Books, and is the co-editor of the bestselling anthology Vampires Never Get Old, as well as the cohost of the writing podcast, Deadline City. She writes romance novels as Zoey Castile. Zoraida was born in Guayaquil, Ecuador, and calls New York City home. When she’s not working, she’s roaming the world in search of magical stories.
Natalie C. Parker is an author, editor, and community organizer. She has written several award winning books for teens and young readers and has edited multiple anthologies including the Indie Bestselling anthology Vampires Never Get Old. Her work has been included on the NPR Best Books list, the Indie Next List, and the TAYSHAS Reading List, and in Junior Library Guild selections. In addition to writing, Natalie also runs Madcap Retreats, which has partnered with We Need Diverse Books and Reese's Book Club to host the writers workshops for their new internship Lit Up. She grew up in a navy family finding home in coastal cities from Virginia to Japan and currently lives with her wife on the Kansas prairie.
Darcie Little Badger is a Lipan Apache writer with a PhD in oceanography. Her critically acclaimed debut novel, Elatsoe, was featured in Time Magazine as one of the best 100 fantasy books of all time. Elatsoe also won the Locus award for Best First Novel and is a Nebula, Ignyte, and Lodestar finalist. Her second fantasy novel, A Snake Falls to Earth, received a Nebula Award and a Newbery Honor and is on the National Book Awards longlist. Darcie is married to a veterinarian named Taran.
Kalynn Bayron is the bestselling author of the award-winning YA fantasy Cinderella Is Dead and This Poison Heart. She is a classically trained vocalist and when she’s not writing you can find her listening to Ella Fitzgerald on loop, attending the theater, watching scary movies, and spending time with her kids. She currently lives in upstate New York with her family.
Preeti Chhibber hails from Atlanta, GA and is an author living the dream and writing her favorite characters. The first book in her Peter Parker trilogy, Spider-Man's Social Dilemma, came out in 2022. She's also a speaker and freelancer. She's written for SYFY, Polygon, and Elle, among others. Find her co-hosting the podcasts Desi Geek Girls and Tar Valon or Bust. You might recognize her from one of several BuzzFeed “look at these tweets” lists.
Rebecca Coffindaffer (they/she) grew up on Star Wars, Star Trek, fantastical movies and even more fantastical books. These days they live in Kansas with their family, writing stories about magic and politics, spaceships, far-off worlds, and people walking away from explosions in slow motion.
Julie C. Dao is the critically acclaimed author of many books for teens and children including Forest of a Thousand Lanterns and Broken Wish. Her novels have earned starred reviews from Booklist, School Library Journal, and Publishers Weekly, won recognition as Junior Library Guild Selections and Kids' Indie Next List picks, and landed on multiple best-of-year lists including YALSA and the American Library Association. A proud Vietnamese-American who was born in upstate New York, she now lives in New England.
Maggie Tokuda-Hall is the author of The Mermaid, the Witch, and the Sea, her debut young adult novel, which was an NPR, Kirkus, School Library Journal and Book Page Best Book of 2020, and its sequel, The Siren, The Song and The Spy. Her graphic novel, Squad, is an Ignyte and Locus Award nominated comic book, and her picture book, Love in the Library, has received starred reviews from Book Page, School Library Journal, Booklist, and Publisher’s Weekly. She lives in Oakland, California with her husband, two kids, and objectively perfect dog. She is perfectly capable of drowning.
Adriana Herrera was born and raised in the Caribbean, but for the last fifteen years has let her job (and her spouse) take her all over the world. She loves writing stories about people who look and sound like her people, getting unapologetic happy endings. Her Dreamers series has received starred reviews from Publishers Weekly and Booklist and has been featured in The TODAY Show on NBC, Entertainment Weekly, OPRAH Magazine, NPR, Library Journal, The New York Times, and The Washington Post. She’s a trauma therapist in New York City, working with survivors of domestic and sexual violence.
June Hur is a bestselling and Edgar Award-winning author of YA historicals, including The Silence of Bones, The Forest of Stolen Girls, The Red Palace, and A Crane Among Wolves. Born in South Korea, June spent her formative years in the USA, Canada, and South Korea before studying History and Literature at the University of Toronto, and working at the city’s public library. Her work has been featured in Forbes, NPR, The New York Times, CBC, and KBS. June resides in Toronto with her family and can be spotted writing in coffee shops.
Katherine Locke is the critically-acclaimed award-winning author of This Rebel Heart, The Girl with the Red Balloon, What Are Your Words? and other titles. They also co-edited and contributed to This Is Our Rainbow and It's A Whole Spiel. They live and write in Philadelphia with their feline overlords and an endless supply of chai lattes.
Kerri Maniscalco grew up in a semi-haunted house outside NYC where her fascination with gothic settings began. She is the #1 NYT bestselling author of the Stalking Jack the Ripper quartet and the Kingdom of the Wicked series.
Julie Murphy lives in North Texas with her husband who loves her, her dog who adores her, and her cats who tolerate her. After several wonderful years in the library world, Julie now writes full-time. When she’s not writing or reliving her reference desk glory days, she can be found watching made-for-TV movies, hunting for the perfect slice of cheese pizza, and planning her next great travel adventure. She is also the #1 New York Times bestselling author of books for all ages including Dumplin’ (now a film on Netflix and one of TIME Magazine's 100 Best YA Books of All Time), Dear Sweet Pea, and If The Shoe Fits. She is also the co-author of A Merry Little Meet Cute. Julie's work has been featured by Good Morning America, Teen Vogue, The New York Times, Vanity Fair, and more.
Gretchen Schreiber grew up between the hills of Kansas and the hospitals of Minnesota, but now calls the hills of Los Angeles home. After getting her MFA from USC Film School, she works as a professional bookworm for Hello Sunshine, Reese Witherspoon’s media company. She is always down to run away to Disneyland or a bookstore.
Julian Winters is the author of the IBPA Benjamin Franklin Gold Award-winning Running With Lions; the Junior Library Guild Selections How to Be Remy Cameron and The Summer of Everything; the multi-starred Right Where I Left You; and As You Walk On By. A self-proclaimed comic book geek, Julian currently lives outside of Atlanta. He can usually be found swooning over rom-coms or watching the only two sports he can follow—volleyball and soccer.
"In this collection of gripping YA short stories, fifteen fantasy authors lure readers in with their siren songs featuring mermaids and other creatures of the deep... What Cordova and Parker have put together is the best of what short story compilations have to offer: engaging stories that leave readers wishing each one were its own complete novel. " —BCCB, starred review
"A seaworthy anthology featuring stories as original as they are enchanting by a range of beloved YA authors... Themes of self-discovery and bonds with nature recur throughout this anthology that features effortless and extensive queer representation. Readers will find favorite tales of mermaid lore in this collection, brimming with myth and magic." —Kirkus
