Erin Bow

Erin Bow (née Noteboom; born April 1, 1972) is an American-born Canadian author. Among other awards and honors, she won the 2011 TD Canadian Children's Literature Award for Plain Kate, the 2014 Monica Hughes Award for Sorrow's Knot, the 2016 Canadian Library Association Book of the Year for Children Award for The Scorpion Rules, and a 2019 Governor General's Award for Stand on the Sky.

Erin Noteboom was born in Des Moines, Iowa, and raised in Omaha, Nebraska. She had one sibling, a younger sister named Wendy. As a child, she was interested in science, writing, and exploring the woods. In her eighth grade year, Noteboom moved from a suburb in Des Moines to a suburb in Omaha. She then attended Mercy High School and graduated in 1990. In high school, she founded the math club and was the captain of the debate team.

She graduated from Creighton University, where she studied physics as a major and writing as a minor. Noteboom chose physics because she believed that it was "easier to become a self-taught writer rather than a self-taught physicist."

After her undergraduate, Noteboom attended a doctoral program in particle physics in Twin Cities, Minnesota. As part of her research, she worked a summer student at the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) near Geneva, Switzerland. During graduate school, Noteboom was diagnosed with a brain tumor. Though doctors initially thought the tumor was fatal, it was ultimately found to be a removable glioma. This diagnosis contributed to a change of priorities for Noteboom, leading her to drop out of graduate school and return full-time to poetry.

Bow wrote poetry and a memoir before focusing on writing young adult works. During this time, she worked various jobs but all related to her passion as a writer. She was the poetry editor for the New Quarterly and organised writing workshops in Kitchener, Ontario. She also worked as a part-time writer at the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics, and participated in the Vancouver Writers Fest Writer-in-Residence program at Rossland Summit School.

As part of St. Jerome University's Reading Series, Bow gave a talk on the intersection between science and literature.

Bow's novels typically depict young adults in a science fiction and fantasy setting. She has written a defense of young adult fantasy, arguing that fantasy books help young adults to fall in love with reading. Bow also likes to write about unsolvable questions.

She takes inspiration from places, such as the prairies she grew up on, Saskatchewan, and the Black Hills in South Dakota. Bow also draws influence from Lakota and Russian folklore. Bow's characters rarely have a default race or sexual orientation. Her themes generally cover the concepts of acting on faith, doing what is right, and being human.