Brent Hartinger

Also a screenwriter, nine of Hartinger's screenplays have been optioned for film, and four are currently in various stages of production, including The Starfish Scream, a gay teen drama; Decked, the animated “true” story behind a deck of playing cards; and Project Sweet Life, a teen caper movie (based on his own novel) currently in production for a 2020 release.

A feature film version of Hartinger's first novel, Geography Club, was released in November 2013, co-starring Scott Bakula. The book is now being developed as a television series.

Hartinger's other books, all for young adults, include Grand & Humble (2006); Project Sweet Life (2008); and Three Truths and a Lie (Simon & Schuster, 2016).

Hartinger has taught creative writing at Vermont College, and is the co-founder of the entertainment website AfterElton.com, which was sold to MTV/Viacom in 2006.

Hartinger is the author of fourteen novels. His first published book was the young adult novel Geography Club (HarperCollins, 2003). He subsequently published seven companion books to that novel, including The Thing I Didn’t Know I Didn’t Know (2014); Barefoot in the City of Broken Dreams (2015); The Road to Amazing (2016); and The Otto Digmore Difference (2017). These last four books were written for adults, and include the teen characters from his earlier YA novels, but now adults in their twenties.

In 1990, Hartinger co-founded one of the world's first LGBT youth support groups, in his hometown of Tacoma, Washington.

Brent Hartinger (born 1971) is an American author, playwright, and screenwriter, best known for his novels about gay teenagers.

Hartinger was born in 1971 in Washington State and grew up in Tacoma, Washington. He earned a bachelor's degree from Gonzaga University in Spokane, Washington, and studied for a masters in psychology at Western Washington University.