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Born and raised in Odessa, Ukraine, a beautiful resort city on the Black Sea, Mila Bernadkin emigrated from the former Soviet Union and came to the United States in 1977. In the USSR she graduated from the Brest Music College, with a BA-equivalent degree in theory of music and music literature, and accepted a teaching position at a children’s music school. After moving to the States, she became a Senior Programmer-Analyst, working at several of the largest financial institutions in New York City. However, medical reasons forced her early retirement, and she realized her life-long dream of becoming a published, award-winning author.

In her award-winning debut novel, The Attitude Girl, Mila Bernadkin draws on her experience as a teacher, mother and advanced graduate of the Institute of Children’s Literature to identify with the tremulous world of confusing emotions and mixed messages of “maturity” today’s teens live in as they feel their way through the process of becoming young adults.

In 2008, Bernadkin’s manuscript for The Attitude Girl became a First-place Winner in the Arizona Authors Association Annual Literary Awards contest. That win resulted in a publishing contract with Five Star Publications, Inc., and the book was published in June 2009. Later, the book was named a First-place Winner in the Young Adult/Teenage category at the 2009 London Book Festival, placed as a Finalist of the 2010 National Indie Excellence Awards, was selected as the Best Young Adult Novel of the Year by the 2010 Premier Book Awards, and additionally received four Honorable Mentions in 2009/2010 literary competitions.
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Bernadkin's articles "Whose Fault Is It Anyway?" and "The Twenty Commandments for Living" were published in several magazines, on many websites and blogs, and also in the National Gallery of Writing.
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Mila is a Member of Society of Children’s Book Writers & Illustrators (SCBWI), Writers and Readers of Distinctive Fiction (WRDF) and International Women’s Writing Guild (IWWG).

Born and raised in Odessa, Ukraine, a beautiful resort city on the Black Sea, Mila Bernadkin emigrated from the former Soviet Union and came to the United States in 1977. In the USSR she graduated from the Brest Music College, with a BA-equivalent degree in theory of music and music literature, and accepted a teaching position at a children’s music school. After moving to the States, she became... More