Mary Quattlebaum

Mary Quattlebaum loved playing pirates, listening to ghost stories, and planting seeds in the family garden as a kid, and these all appear in her books for children, including PIRATE VS. PIRATE; THE HUNGRY GHOST OF RUE ORLEANS; and JO MACDONALD HAD A GARDEN. Mary is the award-winning author of thirty children's books in various forms--picture books, early readers, chapter books, poetry, and nonfiction. Recent titles include BROTHER, SISTER, ME AND YOU (about animal siblings); HERO DOGS; ADORABLE ANIMALS; WINTER FRIENDS; and TOGETHER FOREVER (about animal friendships). And she authored the graphic-hybrid picture book AUNT CEECEE, AUNT BELLE, AND MAMA'S SURPRISE, which was inspired by her own large, exuberant family. Poems and stories for kids have been published in magazines such as CRICKET, SPIDER, LADYBUG, BABYBUG, and HIGHLIGHTS and appeared in anthologies. Mary is faculty in the MFA program in Writing for Children and Young Adults at the Vermont College of Fine Arts, and she speaks frequently at schools and conferences. When she is not writing, Mary likes to garden, read, walk the family dogs, play the harmonica (badly), juggle (very badly), and eat popcorn (noisily).