Eliot Schrefer
Eliot Schrefer (born November 25, 1978) is an American and British author who writes both adult and young adult fiction. He has been a National Book Award finalist twice in the Young People’s Literature category. He teaches creative writing at Fairleigh Dickinson University.
What he’s known for
- Endangered (2012) and Threatened (2014): New York Times critics praised the deep, human-like relationships between characters and apes in these survivor stories.
- The Ape Quartet: Endangered, Threatened, Rescued (2016), and Orphaned (2018) — young readers’ novels about apes and people.
- The Lost Rainforest series: Mez’s Magic (2018), Gogi’s Gambit (2019), and Rumi’s Riddle (2020) — playful adventures inspired by rainforest themes.
- Spirit Animals: Rise and Fall (2014) and Immortal Guardians (2015) — early entries in a popular middle-grade fantasy line.
Other works
- Glamorous Disasters (2006)
- The New Kid (2007)
- Hack the SAT (2008)
- The School for Dangerous Girls (2009)
- The Deadly Sister (2010)
- Greek Fantasy Novel (2011)
- The Darkness Outside Us (2021) — a LGBT young adult sci‑fi novel published by HarperCollins
- Queer Ducks (and Other Animals) (2022)
- Charming Young Man (2023)
- The Brightness Between Us (2024)
Personal life
- Schrefer was born in Chicago, Illinois, to a British mother and an American father. He is openly gay.
The Darkness Outside Us adaptation
- In 2024, Elliot Page’s production company Page Boy Productions optioned the rights to adapt The Darkness Outside Us.
Recent notes
- In 2021, Schrefer and other authors withdrew from the Plum Creek Literacy Festival at Concordia University Nebraska in protest of policies toward LGBT students; the festival was canceled.
This page was last edited on 1 February 2026, at 14:22 (CET).