young adult fantasy author
Esther Scherpenisse
Esther Scherpenisse is a Dutch writer of YA fantasy who lives below sea level but with her head in the clouds. Her debut novel, Cinders and Stars, won SCBWI’s Undiscovered Voices 2024 and was a finalist in the Guppy Books Open Submission Competition. It was published in April 2026 to positive reviews. Order below and join her newsletter to stay informed!
novels
For a thousand years, Kaisi’s people have kept the spellbinders chained to their will. Until those chains break…
Overnight, Kaisi’s father is executed. Her brothers are bound into mindless puppets.
She is spared for one reason: her genius at the forge. The skills she was never meant to have.
Jule, the heir apparent of the rebellion, offers her a bargain: build an impossible device that will give Jule unrivaled power, and Kaisi’s brothers go free.
It’s all Kaisi ever wanted: her family safe and a legacy all her own.
Only Niall, the blacksmith who knows her better than anyone, understands what she’s really being asked to build. Not just a device—a weapon to settle a centuries-old grudge.
Kaisi tells herself she can finish and still have it all. Her brothers. Her legacy. The boy who’s becoming more than just a friend.
She doesn’t look at what it would cost to be wrong.
other published works
Long For This World
Ter ziele
Periphery
Is all writing political?
People say that writing is an act of defiance. And though I hear it often, the sentiment still sits a little oddly with me. Most writing probably pushes back against something—silence, confusion, the absence of a story you'd like to hear. But when I think about why I...
Not just men with boobs; why our fantasy heroines deserve better
Somewhere between the cultural obsession with “harder punishments for crimes” and the flood of female fantasy characters who all know how to wield a sword, I started asking myself a question: is this really what we were going for? We’ve made progress, sure. Women now...
“A compelling, emotionally charged story.” (Goodreads review)
“The story keeps things short and sweet and packs a great punch when it comes to the main character’s choices. Highly recommended.”
(SFF Reviews)