Amber McBride is currently an assistant professor at the University of Virginia. She received her BA in English from James Madison University in 2010 and acquired her MFA in Poetry from Emerson College in 2012. She has also taught English Composition, English Literature and Poetry Composition at James Madison University, Strayer University and Northern Virginia Community College.
Amber is the former media assistant at The Furious Flower Poetry Center where she worked putting together programs and readings to honor African American poets and writers including Maya Angelou, Toni Morrison and Nikki Giovanni.
Her debut YA novel-in-verse, Me (Moth), is about a teen girl who is grieving the deaths of her family, and a teen boy who crosses her path. It’s an exquisite and uplifting novel about identity, first love, and the ways that our memories and our roots steer us through the universe.
Amber is also a poet. Her poetry has appeared in various literary magazines including Ploughshares, Provincetown Arts, DecomP, The Cincinnati Review, The Rumpus and others. Originally from everywhere, Amber was born in Heidelberg, Germany and spent the first 18 years of her life living in several different states. She moved to the Charlottesville area in 2018 and loves calling Albemarle County home.
Her novel-in-verse, We Are All So Good At Smiling, was released in early 2023. Amber’s newest adult poetry collection, Thick With Trouble was released in early 2024. Her forthcoming book, Onyx & Beyond will be released in October 2024.
“Amber McBride is as authentic as an author can be with her writing, her thoughts, and her life. She inspired our teachers with storytelling and the power of her example in building empathy through writing and reading literature and poetry. ” – Loudoun County Schools, 2022
