Sarah Floyd

Survivor Mountain, Sarah Floyd’s newest upper middle grade novel, will be released in 2025.

This action-adventure story is based on real life: when she was a junior in college, Sarah enrolled in a summer program with the National Outdoor Leadership School where she learned to navigate without a compass, climb rock cliffs, and create tools and shelter to survive in the rugged mountain wilderness. The first crush romance, friendships, and frenemy struggles are also based on her own teen experience, along with the story’s themes of post traumatic distress, depression, and anxiety. An author’s note is included to encourage readers to reach out for mental health support when needed. 

Sarah was born in Carmel Highlands, California, where she and her friends ran wild through the Big Sur wilderness that surrounded their homes. They were independent kids, building forts and acting out adventure stories in the woods, relying on each other and their own instincts with no adults telling them what to do until they finally returned home for dinner. Later her family moved to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, and then to San Francisco, California. Sarah always brought her favorite books wherever she moved, and she always made new friends who loved to read. Now she writes books for children and teens — for her, it’s the best job in the world.

Sarah is also the author of the middle grade novel, Butterfly Girl, and the picture book, Ten Clever Ninjas (Clear Fork Publishing). She earned a bachelor’s degree in Communication Studies from U.C. Santa Barbara and is an active member of the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators. She currently lives in Florida with her husband, son, and seventy-pound senior lapdog.

To learn more, please visit her website: sarahfloydbooks.com, or connect on X/Twitter: @kidlitSarah

Butterfly Girl

Twelve-year-old Meghan is abandoned on her grandfather’s Oregon farm, stumbles on an ancestor’s magic spell book . . . and sprouts wings. When her absentee-mother shows up with superstar plans for her Winged Wonder Girl, Meghan must decide if a Hollywood life with the mother she longed for is worth leaving the friends who stood by her, and Grandpa, who loved her before the whole world knew her name.

Survivor Mountain

ARCs Now Available!

Thirteen-year-old Dani tries to live by her motto, fake it ’til you make it.

Faking confidence might lead her back to “normal” and end her decision-making paralysis, a symptom of the anxiety and depression that developed after her older sister’s accidental death, which Dani and her younger sister, Lily, silently blame each other for causing.

Dani reluctantly agrees to allow Lily to join her on a school club hiking trip in the Santa Cruz Mountains—but the fun outing turns harrowing when an earthquake buries their path in a rockslide, leaving Dani’s group separated from their classmates. Dani and Lily, along with Dani’s secret crush and two friends, must find an alternate path off the mountain before nightfall. On the way, they meet a married couple who offer to help—but they turn out to be on-the-run criminals, and “help” is nothing but a trap. Dani and Lily are kidnapped!

No amount of ransom money will save their lives—outwitting the kidnappers is Dani and Lily’s only chance of survival. With the help of her crush, who has been stealthily trailing them, Dani comes up with a plan—but it’s a high-stakes con-game that will push the two sisters’ trust and courage to the limits.

If she fails it means certain death. But if she succeeds, Dani won’t have to fake it ’til she makes it anymore—she will prove to herself that she is becoming the person she wants to be.

Bold. Brave. Decisive. Her older sister would be proud.