Debbie Rigaud Books in Order

If you want a smart YA rom-com first: Truly Madly Royally → Simone Breaks All the Rules
If you want Haitian culture with a touch of magic: A Girl's Guide to Love & Magic
If you're reading with a middle grader: Project Middle School → Project Animal Rescue → Project Class President → Project Go Green
If you want a funny magical adventure for younger readers: The Sister Switch
If you want her earliest teen romance: Perfect Shot

Debbie Rigaud was born in Manhattan to Haitian immigrant parents, and her family soon moved from Brooklyn to East Orange, New Jersey. She has described that neighborhood as a magical place: her cousins lived next door, and the boy across the street later became her husband. That closeness, along with Haitian culture and New Jersey life, still shows up all over her fiction.

Writing came first.

As a kid and teen, she filled journals, wrote very earnest poetry, and kept going. In college she wrote for the school paper, and after graduation she landed an editorial internship at Time Inc. in New York. From there she built a magazine career covering entertainment and news for readers at outlets that included Seventeen, CosmoGIRL!, Twist, and Essence. She interviewed celebrities, politicians, and public figures, but she has said the people she most enjoyed talking to were ordinary girls sharing their real lives.

Her move into fiction seems to have come less from a grand plan than from staying close to young readers. Because she was already writing for teen magazines, she was invited to contribute the novella Double Act to the anthology Hallway Diaries. That opened the door to Perfect Shot, her first standalone novel, a teen romantic comedy about a volleyball player who gets swept into a modeling competition. It is light on its feet, but it is also interested in confidence, image, and what happens when attention starts pulling you in different directions.

Then there was a long gap.

Rigaud kept writing, and when she returned to books, she came back with a clearer sense of the stories she wanted to tell. Truly Madly Royally pairs an ambitious New Jersey teen with a prince and turns a royal fantasy into a funny story about class, confidence, and staying grounded. With Alyssa Milano, she later co-created the New York Times bestselling Hope books, which bring activism, STEM, and middle school nerves together in a very approachable way. Then came Simone Breaks All the Rules, a warm, sharp senior-year story about strict parents, first love, and learning what independence actually costs.

She has also stretched in other directions without losing her voice. A Girl's Guide to Love & Magic brings romance and the supernatural into a Brooklyn story rooted in Haitian and Caribbean culture, while The Sister Switch leans younger and more playful, using magical chaos and sibling rivalry to explore family roles. Across those books, readers tend to find the same strengths: humor, heart, and girls who are trying hard to figure themselves out without pretending to already have the answers.

Her heroines are usually bright, funny, and a little stubborn. They care about family, friendship, and doing the right thing, even when they get in their own way. Haitian American identity appears often, but so do very ordinary worries: crushes, school pressure, embarrassment, wanting more freedom, and learning how to speak up without losing yourself. Even when a book starts with a fairy-tale setup or a magical problem, the feelings underneath stay real.

In recent years, Rigaud has lived in the Columbus, Ohio, area with her husband and children. She still writes for young readers and moves easily between romance, middle grade realism, and stories with a touch of magic. That range suits her. So does the mix of warmth, comedy, and community that keeps turning up in everything she writes.