Margaret Stohl

Career

Stohl is the co-author, along with her friend Kami Garcia of the "Caster Chronicles" book series, starting with Beautiful Creatures. The series, currently consisting of four books and a novella collection, is generally classified as a contemporary young adult fantasy novel, with particular interest for teens. It is set in the fictional small town of Gatlin, South Carolina in the Southern United States, and deals with a group of townspeople, friends, witches (called "Casters" in the books), and numerous other magical creatures.

The first book, Beautiful Creatures reached International Bestseller Status and is on the New York Times Best Seller List. It has been published in 39 countries and translated into 28 languages. It was made into the 2013 film Beautiful Creatures. Her books and the film adaptation have found wide audiences. Two spin-off books by Stohl and Garcia, Dangerous Creatures and Dangerous Deception, were also best-sellers.

Following the release of her first two solo novels, the YA science fiction Icons series (Icons and Idols, optioned for development by Alcon Entertainment, the team behind the Beautiful Creatures feature film), Margaret began to work with Sana Amanat of Marvel Comics and Emily Meehan of Marvel Press (a part of Disney Publishing) on a series of YA novels featuring the popular Marvel Avengers character Natasha Romanoff, the Black Widow. Black Widow: Forever Red was an instant New York Times bestseller, and given generally favorable reviews, including an "A" rating by Entertainment Weekly. Black Widow: Red Vengeance soon followed.

After writing two one-shots for Marvel Comics (based on a YA character invented for the novels, Ava Orlova, also known as the Red Widow) Margaret was asked to write the Mighty Captain Marvel comic on an ongoing basis in December 2016. After G. Willow Wilson, Margaret became the second female creator ever invited to attend the Marvel Creative Summit.

In April 2017, Margaret released her eleventh YA novel, Royce Rolls, a satirical look at Los Angeles' celebrity culture. The book was published by Disney's Freeform Press, and released with a Royce Rolls / Freeform book trailer lampooning a reality television family.

Margaret Stohl also works in the video game industry. She formerly worked for Activision, Westwood Studios, and Electronic Arts and, with her husband Lewis Peterson, cofounded 7 Studios. She still consults on videogame projects. Her brother, David Stohl, runs the Activision-owned studio Infinity Ward and works on the Call of Duty franchise.

A graduate of Amherst College, where she won the Knox Prize for English Literature, Margaret earned a master's degree in English from Stanford University and completed coursework for a doctorate in American Studies at Yale University. Margaret was a teaching assistant in Romantic Poetry at Stanford and in Film Studies at Yale. She attended the Creative Writing program of the University of East Anglia, where she was mentored by the Scottish poet George MacBeth.

Margaret co-founded two literacy-based non-profits for teen and youth, the YALLFEST book festival in Charleston, South Carolina (with her former writing partner, Kami Garcia, as well as Jonathan Sanchez of Charleston's Blue Bicycle Books) and the YALLWEST book festival in Santa Monica, California (with best-selling author and friend, Melissa de la Cruz.) The two festivals are the largest dedicated youth and teen festivals in the United States. Margaret is also a regional board member for Facing History and Ourselves, an organization dedicated to advocating empathy and eliminating bias (whether based on race, religion, gender or sexuality) in schools.