The Secret Astronomers: A Guest Post by Jessica Walker

Two students at Green Bank High School communicate through an old textbook using notes, drawings and secrets to bring them together for a heartfelt story of connection and self-discovery. Read on for an exclusive essay from Jessica Walker on writing The Secret Astronomers, the Young Adult Winner of the 2026 Children's & YA Book Awards!

 

Two strangers. One forgotten astronomy textbook. A decades-old secret.

A fascinating, highly illustrated, epistolary novel perfect for fans of Rainbow Rowell and Alice Oseman, featuring designed doodled edges!

 

This book grew out of my curiosity about communication, both with life beyond our planet and with people right here on Earth. I’m fascinated by how we humans reach for connection across vast differences whether it’s a galaxy, a belief system or our lived experiences. That curiosity eventually led me to Green Bank, West Virginia, a tiny town with a world renowned observatory that requires everyone in the vicinity to live without modern communication technology. Experts agree it’s one of the most fascinating spots in the cosmos.

I grew up near this region and was shaped by the textures, traditions, and storytelling of rural Appalachia. It’s a part of the world that is often misunderstood or flattened into stereotypes. I wanted to create a story that invites the reader to look deeply at this culturally complex place. In The Secret Astronomers, Green Bank isn’t just a setting; it’s a character with its own rhythms, silences, and mysteries. Capturing that felt essential.

My research took me there in person, where I spent time with the remarkable community surrounding the Green Bank Observatory. I visited the local historical society, walked through the landscape with botanists and awed at the sky with astrophysicists. A local farmer taught me how to make ink from boiled walnut shells and paintbrushes from squirrel hair. Highly recommend.

The scientific thread of the book reaches back to a college class I took called Life Beyond the Earth. As an art major fulfilling my only science requirement, I was surprisingly swept away into the philosophical dimensions of humanity’s search for extraterrestrial intelligence. It dawned on me that it doesn’t matter if you’re an artist or an astrophysicist—sensing signals and trying to interpret the unknown is essentially what we all do in some form or another.

It’s both surreal and deeply grounding to have my debut novel loose in the world. An English professor once told me that I didn’t know what I was doing as a writer. This little gem of unsolicited feedback fuels me to this day. Thanks, Prof! I’ve found that writing is like making art: messy, intuitive, sometimes bewildering, but also full of discovery.

Now, holding the finished book, I feel immense gratitude. This story is the result of so many people: the community that inspired it, my agent who believed in it, editors and designers who took up the challenge, student researchers who helped me dig deeper, and my friends and family, whose support made the work possible. To see it out in the world and finding its way to readers is humbling and extraordinary.