Alexa Donne author page

Alexa Donne biography

Alexa Donne is an American author of young adult science fiction, romance and mystery thrillers. Alongside her writing career, she has worked in television marketing and produced a YouTube channel offering advice on writing, literary agents and the publishing industry. She graduated from Boston University and has also been involved in mentoring aspiring authors through the Author Mentor Match programme.

Her debut novel, Brightly Burning, was published by HMH Teen in 2018. A science fiction retelling of Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre, it follows seventeen-year-old Stella Ainsley, who accepts employment aboard a mysterious spaceship called the Rochester. Donne followed this with The Stars We Steal (2020), a futuristic reimagining of Jane Austen’s Persuasion, published in the UK by Titan Books. The story centres on Princess Leonie Kolburg, whose financially troubled family hopes she will make an advantageous marriage.

Donne moved into young adult crime fiction with The Ivies, published by Crown Books for Young Readers in May 2021. Set at an exclusive American boarding school, the novel follows five ambitious students competing for admission to prestigious universities. It was selected for the Young Adult Library Services Association’s Teens’ Top Ten in 2022.

Her next thriller, Pretty Dead Queens, was published by Crown Books for Young Readers in October 2022. It follows teenager Cecelia Ellis, who investigates the murder of a homecoming queen in a California coastal town where a similar crime occurred decades earlier. The novel was nominated for the 2023 Edgar Allan Poe Award for Best Young Adult.

Donne’s fifth novel, The Bitter End, was published by Random House Books for Young Readers in October 2024. Inspired by Agatha Christie’s And Then There Were None, the thriller follows eight students stranded at an isolated Colorado ski chalet, where members of their group begin dying under suspicious circumstances. The book received a nomination for the 2025 Edgar Allan Poe Award for Best Young Adult, making it Donne’s second nomination in that category.