Search
Close this search box.
Search
Close this search box.
Shea
Adult & YA Novelist
#1 New York Times Bestseller
Travels from: Bend, OR

“A lurid, fast-paced story of a reclusive commune. . . . The twisty plot brims with tension. There’s plenty of fodder here for a miniseries.” — Publishers Weekly

Shea Ernshaw is the #1 New York Times, USA Today and Indie bestselling author of The Wicked Deep, Winterwood, A Wilderness of Stars, Long Live the Pumpkin Queen and A History of Wild Places.Her books have been published in over twenty countries, repeatedly chosen as Indie Next Picks, and A History of Wild Places was a Book of the Month selection. Long Live the Pumpkin Queen was named a “Best Book of 2022” by Barnes & Noble. She is also the winner of the Oregon Book Award.

Hocus Pocus and Practical Magic meets the Salem Witch trials in The Wicked Deep, about three sisters on a quest for revenge—and how love may be the only thing powerful enough to stop them.  Winterwood, is a haunting romance, where dark fairy tales and enchanted folklore collide after a boy, believed to be missing, emerges from the magical woods—and falls in love with the witch determined to unravel his secrets. Her third YA novel, A Wilderness of Star, Vega is the last astronomer—the last of her kind who can look up at the night sky and map the stars. But this knowledge makes her valuable. Ruthlessly hunted by a group known as Theorists, Vega will flee into the wilderness with two unlikely companions—Noah and Cricket. Together they will travel across the unknown frontier, pursued by men on horseback, to a place where Vega’s knowledge of the stars will either save them all, or destroy everything.

Her first adult novel, A History of Wild Places, is an atmospheric thriller that messes with your mind in the best way” (Laini Taylor, New York Times bestselling author), three residents of a secluded, seemingly peaceful commune investigate the disappearances of two outsiders. It’s a story about fairy tales, our fear of the dark, and losing yourself within the wilderness of your mind. Shea lives in a small mountain town in Oregon, and is happiest when lost in a good book, lost in the woods, or writing her next novel.

Shea’s Authors Out Loud Profile: 

Shea's Featured Titles

A Wilderness of Stars

Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers |
Young Adult Fiction

In this magical romance from the New York Times bestselling author of The Wicked Deep, an illness cursing the land forces a teen girl astronomer to venture across the wilderness in search of the stars’ message that will, hopefully, save them all.

If magic lives anywhere, it’s in the stars…

Vega has lived in the valley her whole life—forbidden by her mother to leave the safety of its borders because of the unknown threats waiting for her in the wilds beyond. But after her mother dies, and Vega sees the fabled twin stars in the sky, it’s an omen she can no longer ignore, forcing her to leave the protective boundaries of the valley. But the outside world turns out to be much more terrifying than Vega could have imagined. People are gravely sick—they lose their eyesight and their hearing, just before they lose their lives.

What Vega keeps to herself is that she is the Last Astronomer—a title carried from generation to generation—and she is the only one who carries the knowledge of the stars. Knowledge that could hold the key to the cure. And so when locals spot the tattoo on Vega’s neck in the shape of a constellation—the mark of an astronomer—chaos erupts as the threats her mother warned her about become all too real.

Fearing for her life, Vega is rescued by a girl named Cricket who leads her to Noah, a boy marked by his own mysterious tattoos. On the run from the men who are hunting her, Vega, Cricket, and Noah set out across the plains in search of the cure the stars speak of. But as the lines between friend and protector begin to blur, Vega must decide whether to safeguard the sacred knowledge of the astronomer. Or if she will risk everything to try to save them all.

Long Live the Pumpkin Queen

Disney Press |
Young Adult Fiction

Read Sally’s story in this young adult companion to Tim Burton’sThe Nightmare Before Christmas written by New York Times bestselling Shea Ernshaw.

Jack and Sally are “truly meant to be” … or are they?

Sally Skellington is the official, newly-minted Pumpkin Queen after a whirlwind courtship with her true love, Jack, who Sally adores with every inch of her fabric seams– if only she could say the same for her new role as Queen of Halloween Town. Cast into the spotlight and tasked with all sorts of queenly duties, Sally can’t help but wonder if all she’s done is trade her captivity under Dr. Finkelstein for a different cage. But when Sally and Zero accidentally uncover a long-hidden doorway to an ancient realm called Dream Town, she’ll unknowingly set into motion a chain of sinister events that put her future as Pumpkin Queen, and the future of Halloween Town itself, into jeopardy. Can Sally discover what it means to be true to herself and save the town she’s learned to call home, or will her future turn into her worst… well, nightmare?

A History of Wild Places

Atria |
Novel

In this “riveting, atmospheric thriller that messes with your mind in the best way” (Laini Taylor, New York Times bestselling author), three residents of a secluded, seemingly peaceful commune investigate the disappearances of two outsiders.

Travis Wren has an unusual talent for locating missing people. Often hired by families as a last resort, he takes on the case of Maggie St. James—a well-known author of dark, macabre children’s books—and is soon led to a place many believed to be only a legend.

Called Pastoral, this reclusive community was founded in the 1970s by like-minded people searching for a simpler way of life. By all accounts, the commune shouldn’t exist anymore and soon after Travis stumbles upon it…he disappears. Just like Maggie St. James.

Years later, Theo, a lifelong member of Pastoral, discovers Travis’s abandoned truck beyond the border of the community. No one is allowed in or out, not when there’s a risk of bringing a disease—rot—into Pastoral. Unraveling the mystery of what happened reveals secrets that Theo, his wife, Calla, and her sister, Bee, keep from one another. Secrets that prove their perfect, isolated world isn’t as safe as they believed—and that darkness takes many forms.

“As spine-chilling as it is beautifully crafted” (Ruth Emmie Lang, author of Beasts of Extraordinary Circumstance), A History of Wild Places is a story about fairy tales, our fear of the dark, and losing yourself within the wilderness of your mind.

Winterwood

Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers |
Young Adult Fiction

From New York Times bestselling author of The Wicked Deep comes a haunting romance perfect for fans of Practical Magic, where dark fairy tales and enchanted folklore collide after a boy, believed to be missing, emerges from the magical woods—and falls in love with the witch determined to unravel his secrets.

Be careful of the dark, dark wood…

Especially the woods surrounding the town of Fir Haven. Some say these woods are magical. Haunted, even.

Rumored to be a witch, only Nora Walker knows the truth. She and the Walker women before her have always shared a special connection with the woods. And it’s this special connection that leads Nora to Oliver Huntsman—the same boy who disappeared from the Camp for Wayward Boys weeks ago—and in the middle of the worst snowstorm in years. He should be dead, but here he is alive, and left in the woods with no memory of the time he’d been missing.

But Nora can feel an uneasy shift in the woods at Oliver’s presence. And it’s not too long after that Nora realizes she has no choice but to unearth the truth behind how the boy she has come to care so deeply about survived his time in the forest, and what led him there in the first place. What Nora doesn’t know, though, is that Oliver has secrets of his own—secrets he’ll do anything to keep buried, because as it turns out, he wasn’t the only one to have gone missing on that fateful night all those weeks ago.

For as long as there have been fairy tales, we have been warned to fear what lies within the dark, dark woods and in Winterwood, New York Times bestselling author Shea Ernshaw, shows us why.

The Wicked Deep

Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers |
Young Adult Fiction

A New York Times bestseller

Hocus Pocus and Practical Magic meets the Salem Witch trials in this haunting story about three sisters on a quest for revenge—and how love may be the only thing powerful enough to stop them.

Welcome to the cursed town of Sparrow…

Where, two centuries ago, three sisters were sentenced to death for witchery. Stones were tied to their ankles and they were drowned in the deep waters surrounding the town.

Now, for a brief time each summer, the sisters return, stealing the bodies of three weak-hearted girls so that they may seek their revenge, luring boys into the harbor and pulling them under.

Like many locals, seventeen-year-old Penny Talbot has accepted the fate of the town. But this year, on the eve of the sisters’ return, a boy named Bo Carter arrives; unaware of the danger he has just stumbled into.

Mistrust and lies spread quickly through the salty, rain-soaked streets. The townspeople turn against one another. Penny and Bo suspect each other of hiding secrets. And death comes swiftly to those who cannot resist the call of the sisters.

But only Penny sees what others cannot. And she will be forced to choose: save Bo, or save herself.

Authors-Unbound_icon-web-link.png

A History of Wild Places - Library Presentation

Authors-Unbound_icon-web-link.png

Young Adult Audiences - The Wicked Deep and Winterwood

Shea’s Upcoming Events

Honors, Awards & Recognition

New York Times Bestseller
Spring 2018 Indie Next Pick
B&N Teen Blog Most Anticipated Debuts of 2018
B&N Teen Blog Most Anticipated YA Fantasy of 2018
Goodreads Most Anticipated YA Novels of 2018
BookBubs 14 New Books “Harry Potter” Fans Will Love In 2018

Media Kit

By clicking the link below you will be directed to a Google Docs Folder
where you can download author photos and cover images.

Similar Authors

Katherine
Bestselling Novelist & Middle Grade Author
Stephanie
Bestselling Young Adult Novelist
Faridah
Bestselling Young Adult Novelist
Angeline
Bestselling Young Adult Novelist
JC
Bestselling Novelist

Interested in hosting this author?
Send us a message and an A|U Agent will return to you ASAP!