PRESS KIT

SHORT BIO:

Ismée Williams is an award-winning author of books about multicultural characters that pack an emotional punch. Ismée’s work includes young adult novels Water in May, This Train Is Being Held, and picture book, Abuelo, the Sea, and Me. Ismée is also an editor and contributor of the YA anthology, Boundless: Twenty Voices Celebrating Multicultural and Multiracial Identities. Ismée has been an invited speaker at The Virginia Festival of the Book, The Miami Book Fair, The NYC Teen Author Festival, The Southern Kentucky Book Festival, The Texas Book Festival and The Bronx Book Festival among others. Ismée is a co-founder of the Latinx Kidlit Book Festival as well as a pediatric cardiologist in New York City where she lives with her family. She is the daughter of a Cuban immigrant and grew up listening to her abuelo’s bedtime stories. Follow her on Twitter and IG @IsmeeWilliams and her website: ismeewilliams.com.

LONG BIO:

Ismée Williams is an award-winning author of books about multicultural characters that pack an emotional punch. Ismée’s work includes young adult novels Water in May, This Train Is Being Held, and picture book, Abuelo, the Sea, and Me, published in 2024 with Roaring Brook. WATER IN MAY is a contemporary YA novel about a fifteen year-old Dominican-American girl, Mari, who wants more than anything to have a baby so someone in her family will love her. Mari is forced to face challenges she never imagined when she learns the baby she's carrying has only half a heart. Published by Amulet Books in the Fall of 2017, Water in May earned a Kirkus starred review and was called "Fierce and tender—and absolutely worth reading", while VOYA described it as "realistic and compelling, heartfelt and heartbreaking."  Her second book, THIS TRAIN IS BEING HELD, about a Dominican-American boy from the Heights and a Cuban-American girl from the Upper East Side who meet while riding the subway, was published in February 2020. Called “a nuanced and tenderly pitched story,” by National Book Award Winner Elizabeth Acevedo, and “Heartfelt and meaty” by Kirkus, THIS TRAIN IS BEING HELD is a romance that tackles issues of racism and mental health and is a Junior Library Guild Gold Standard Selection and winner of the ILBA Gold Medal for best YA Romance. Ismée is a coeditor and contributor of the YA anthology Boundless: Twenty Voices Celebrating Multicultural and Multiracial Identities, published by Inkyard in 2023. Ismée has been an invited speaker at The Virginia Festival of the Book, The Miami Book Fair, The NYC Teen Author Festival, The Southern Kentucky Book Festival, The Texas Book Festival, and The Bronx Book Festival among others. Ismée is a co-founder of the Latinx Kidlit Book Festival as well as a pediatric cardiologist in New York City where she lives with her family. She is the daughter of a Cuban immigrant and grew up listening to her abuelo’s bedtime stories. Follow her on Twitter and IG @IsmeeWilliams and her website: ismeewilliams.com.

SOCIAL MEDIA LINKS:

Website: ismeewilliams.com

Twitter: @IsmeeWilliams

Instagram: @IsmeeWilliams

FaceBook: https://www.facebook.com/WaterinMay/