Holly Webb started writing fiction almost by accident, when she was working as an editor. She wrote her first book on trains, and had to leave it on someone’s desk with a note as she was too scared to say she’d written it. Since then, she’s written many, many more and usually works on the sofa, which is much more comfortable than a train. She lives near Reading with her family and a cat.

Jo Lodge is an illustrator and a paper engineer and was greatly influenced by her artistic parents – her mother, Maureen Roffey, is an illustrator and her father, Bernard Lodge, a graphic designer. Jo’s first books were published by Campbell Books in 1996. Since then, her appealing, boldly coloured characters have appeared in a huge range of titles but she is perhaps best known for her Mr Croc character (Hodder) which has sold over a million copies worldwide. She lives in West Sussex with her husband and two sons.

Sue Ransom, the author of Small Blue Thing, Perfectly Reflected, Scattering Like Light, and The Beneath is a senior headhunter, but on the way to work and in the evenings she’s a writer: she wrote Small Blue Thing, her debut novel, as a birthday present for her daughter, and she composed it mostly on her BlackBerry. Serendipity led her to Nosy Crow, and she’s now busy thinking up her next project. She lives with her husband and two teenage children in Surrey.

Nadia Shireen, the illustrator of The Baby That Roared, studied law and worked as a music journalist before following what she always felt to be her destiny through an MA in Children’s Book Illustration at Cambridge School of Art. Nadia has been shortlisted for the Roald Dahl Funny Prize and the Waterstones Children’s Book Prize.

Jill was born in Los Angeles, California into a family of artists and musician. She studied art at SUNY Purchase and School of Visual Arts in New York. Before fulfilling her lifelong dream of creating picture books, Jill illustrated magazines, book covers, posters and design projects in the United States and Germany. She’s had several pieces shown at the NY Society of Illustrators. When she’s not working on books, she’s painting the New Mexico landscape or enjoying herself with her partner and their dogs on Higglety Pigglety Farm in Albuquerque.

Alice is a poet and the author of the best-selling Little Blue Truck. She has written more than 40 books, mostly for children. A mother and former elementary school teacher, Alice is a graduate of the University of Southern California. Many of her most famous works are poetic in nature, though she writes about a wide variety of topics.

G. R. Gemin was born in Cardiff, South Wales, of Italian parentage, and lives in London. He spends much of his non-writing time listening to a variety of music, from Jimmy Smith to Giuseppe Verdi, with whom he is particularly obsessed. He speaks enough Italian to order ice cream, cake, or both.