Aida Salazar is an award-winning author and arts activist whose writings for adults and children explore issues of identity and social justice. She is the author of the critically acclaimed middle grade verse novels The Moon Within and Land of the Cranes, as well as the picture book anthology In the Spirit of a Dream: 13 Stories of American Immigrants of Color. Her forthcoming books include the middle grade anthology My New Gift: 16 Period Stories from BIPOC Authors (September 2022), the middle grade historical fiction A Seed in the Sun (October 2022), and the picture book biography Jovita Wore Pants: The Story of a Mexican Freedom Fighter (March 2023). Aida is a founding member of LAS MUSAS—a Latinx kidlit debut author collective. Her story, “By the Light of the Moon,” was adapted into a ballet production by the Sonoma Conservatory of Dance and is the first Xicana-themed ballet in history. She lives with her family of artists in a teal house in Oakland, CA.