Naomi Hughes Books in Order

If you want twisty YA sci-fi: Afterimage → Refraction
If you want a fantasy standalone: Mercurial
If you want a younger, monster-fighting adventure: The Shadowed Flame

Naomi Hughes grew up all over the United States before her family finally settled in the Midwest. She has said that books helped make all that moving feel less lonely, which makes a lot of sense once you see the kinds of stories she writes now, fast, imaginative, and full of teens trying to keep their footing when the world turns strange.

Writing was there early. Hughes has talked about working in lots of forms before novels, including short stories, poetry, and journalism, and even writing full books for fun in junior high and high school. She later earned a bachelor's degree in Mass Communication, where some of her coursework focused on writing for media.

The real shift came in her mid twenties. In one interview, Hughes said a stretch of being mostly jobless and very bored finally pushed her to sit down and write seriously, even though she felt she had no idea what she was doing yet.

She learned fast.

About six months after she began writing books with publication in mind, she found representation with The Shadowed Flame, a fantasy that started life as a short story about a snarky unicorn rider. She has also been very open about how messy that learning curve was, rewriting the book from scratch after tough feedback and realizing, like a lot of writers do, that the first version was not the final version.

Her first published novel was Afterimage in 2018. The book follows Camryn Kingfisher, the lone survivor of a massive explosion, as she searches for answers with help from Quint, a transparent boy only she can see. Hughes has said the seed of that story came while watching Neil deGrasse Tyson's Cosmos, and readers who start here usually come for the mystery and high stakes, then stay for the emotional pull.

Then came Refraction, another YA science fiction novel, this time darker and creepier. Its setup is classic Hughes in the best way, an alien attack, outlawed mirrors, spreading fog, and a teenager named Marty Callahan trying to survive the consequences. She has said she wants readers with mental illnesses to see people like themselves at the center of the story, and that shows in her fiction. Afterimage includes panic disorder, while Refraction centers a hero with OCD, but in both books the characters are never reduced to a diagnosis.

Fantasy readers have plenty to dig into too. Mercurial throws a feared princess, a conflicted bodyguard, and an assassin sister into a brutal power struggle shaped by blood magic and memory loss. The Shadowed Flame goes in a more adventurous direction, with secret unicorn riders, monster fights, and the awkward spark of reconnecting with a former best friend. Across all of these books, Hughes keeps returning to big questions about identity, loyalty, fear, and what happens when the official story is not the true one.

She likes a strange premise, but she grounds it in people first.

That is probably why her books feel both high concept and easy to step into. Time and space can buckle. Mirrors can turn murderous. Magic can run through metal or live on in unicorns. But underneath all that, Hughes keeps coming back to grief, guilt, crushes, family pressure, friendship, and the hard work of deciding who to trust.

In her author bios, Hughes describes the Midwest as home, even when tornadoes or blizzards make that a questionable choice. She has also worked as a freelance editor, and has mentioned hobbies like knitting, reading, gaming, anime, travel, British TV, and Marvel. It all fits her fiction pretty well, curious, a little offbeat, and always ready to ask what happens if one impossible thing suddenly becomes real.