Valerie Hobbs won the PEN/Norma Klein Prize in 1999, a biennial prize that honors an emerging voice of literary distinction among American children's fiction writers. Defiance, Anything but Ordinary, and The Last Best Days of Summer are among her young adult and middle-grade titles. She has a B.A. in English. as well as a M.A. She holds a bachelor's degree in English from the University of California, Santa Barbara, and has taught academic writing there. Valerie and her husband live in Santa Barbara, California.