Kayla Cottingham author page

Kayla Cottingham biography

Kayla Cottingham is an American author of young adult horror and fantasy and a former teen librarian. Her debut novel, My Dearest Darkest, was published by Sourcebooks Fire in 2022 and became a New York Times and Publishers Weekly bestseller.

My Dearest Darkest follows Finch Chamberlin, a new student at the competitive Ulalume Academy, where she and a group of girls accidentally summon a dangerous supernatural creature capable of granting their desires at a terrible cost. Cottingham followed it with This Delicious Death, published by Sourcebooks Fire in 2023, a YA horror novel about four friends affected by a phenomenon that leaves them dependent on synthetic human flesh.

Her fantasy novel Practical Rules for Cursed Witches was published by Delacorte Press in 2024. It centres on teenage witch Delilah Bea, whose magical training requires her to break a powerful family curse. Its companion novel, Extraordinary Quests for Amateur Witches, was published by Delacorte Press in 2025 and follows an amateur witch undertaking a magical quest.

Cottingham has also written for younger readers. The Tale of the Vanishing Circus, published by Amulet Books in 2025, is the third novel in the middle-grade Are You Afraid of the Dark? series inspired by the Nickelodeon television programme. It follows thirteen-year-old Riley and her friend Genna after they discover a mysterious circus in the woods and become caught up in its sinister secrets.