Alexandra.Leigh Young author page

Alexandra Leigh Young biography

Alexandra Leigh Young is a young adult author and podcast producer. Before publishing fiction, she spent three years producing tours for pop bands and later worked as a freelance journalist in South Korea. An assignment about K-pop for NPR’s Radiolab provided the basis for her first YA novel. She has also worked as a producer on The Daily, the news podcast from The New York Times.

Young’s debut novel, Idol Gossip, was first published by Walker Books US in 2021. Walker Books published the UK edition, subtitled A K-Pop Dream Come True, in April 2022. It follows seventeen-year-old Alice Choy, who moves from San Francisco to Seoul and is recruited to an entertainment company’s training academy, where she becomes part of a prospective K-pop girl group. Walker Books recommends the UK edition for readers aged 12 and above.

Her second YA novel, Lou with the Band, draws on Young’s experience working with touring musicians. The novel follows Lou, a Cuban-American teenager who postpones university to join the crew of a major international concert tour. It was selected by the Junior Library Guild and published by Walker Books US, part of Candlewick Press, on 7 October 2025.