Karen Spafford-Fitz grew up in an old limestone farmhouse that she suspects was haunted. “My childhood home near Kingston, Ontario expressed itself through an alarming range of squeaks, creaks, moans, groans, bumps and thumps—especially on dark, stormy nights. It was perfect for fuelling the imagination of a young writer-to-be!” Karen’s early training as a writer involved reading thousands of books. “As a child, I had mounds of books on my nightstand that frequently avalanched onto the floor. These mounds included the Anne of Green Gables stories, Little House on the Prairie, Nancy Drew, The Hardy Boys, and Trixie Belden. I was horse-crazy too, so Black Beauty, The Black Stallion, and my dad’s old Lone Ranger books were also favorites. At one point, I went through a horror-story phase where I read the creepiest books I could find—even though they scared me to death.” Karen later went to Queen’s University, where she received degrees in English and in Education. For the next eight years, she taught elementary and junior high students in Toronto and in Edmonton. Although Karen enjoyed teaching, she wanted a home-based career after her daughters were born, and so she turned to freelance writing. One of her projects involved writing educational software for students, which helped Karen discover her love of writing for young people. She soon began creating her own stories for children and teenagers, and Dog Walker, Karen’s first book, was released in March 2006. When Karen is not writing, she is often reading, gardening, running, skiing or enjoying Edmonton’s river valley with her husband, her two daughters and her two enormous dogs. Karen also enjoys visiting schools and libraries in the Edmonton area where she speaks to students about the inspiration for her stories, the creative process, and the writing life.

VALLERY HYDUK swam competitively for twelve years. For nine of those years, she competed at the national level. At sixteen, she was ranked 16th in the world. She attended the University of Michigan on an athletic scholarship. Vallery now owns her own television production company in Toronto and writes for television, radio, and the Web. She is a member of the Ontario College of Teachers, Canadian Women in Communications, and the Canadian Film and Television Producers Association.

Martyn N. Godfrey (April 17, 1949—2000) was an English-Canadian author of children's fantasy books. Born in Birmingham, England, he moved to Toronto, Ontario when he was eight. Godfrey graduated from university in 1974 with a teaching degree. Godfrey was the Edmonton Public Library’s writer-in-residence in 1989. He died in 2000. The Young Alberta Book Association presents an annual Martyn Godfrey Young Writers Award in his name.

To celebrate the Year 2000, Alex O’Brien took a leave of absence from his career as a human resources director to write. After an enjoyable and prolific sabbatical, highlighted by winning the lyric category of the USA Songwriting Contest (Drum Machines and Beauty Queens), Alex decided to devote his creative energy to writing permanently and resigned from his executive position. He spent the next fifteen years completing seven novels, a collection of short stories, a writer's memoir, eight plays, three musical books, two collections of poetry, and close to five-hundred song lyrics. This period brought much success and recognition including honourable mention for a poem and a play in the 2001 Writer’s Digest Writing Competition (In My Garden and Horseshoe Reflections), second place in the singer-songwriter category of the 2002 Dallas Songwriters’ Association Song Contest (Belfast Novels), and finalist status in the lyric category of the 2002 USA Songwriting Contest (I Should Have Stayed). Since then, his musical comedy, Saturday Night on Bourbon Street, has received public readings at the St. Lawrence Theatre in Toronto, showcased by Heretic Productions, and the Stockey Centre for the Performing Arts in Parry Sound, directed by Amanda Gibley of Limelight Theatre, as well as a director’s workshop conducted by the City of Brampton Theatres, coordinated by Scott Lale, the Artistic Director. In 2006, Alex’s songwriting activities culminated in a publishing deal for eight of his songs co-written by Willie McCulloch and managed by Scot Tex Music Publishing. During this period, Alex also added a Bachelor of Arts in English Literature, with High Honours, to his Bachelor of Commerce and Master of Industrial Relations degrees. Over the past three years, he has taken over thirty MOOCs including How to Write Fiction and How to Write Poetry from the University of Iowa’s esteemed writing program. He lives with his vivacious wife near Parry Sound, Ontario and they have two wonderful children. The Comeback is Alex's second published novel. It was released by James Lorimer and Company Ltd. Publishers in its Sports Stories series on February 4th, 2020. Alex's first book, The Playmaker, came out a year earlier on February 5th, 2019.

Lorna Schultz Nicholson is a full-time writer who has published over 30 books, including children's picture books, middle grade, YA fiction and sports non-fiction. Fragile Bones is her latest in her One-2-One series. It is about a teen with high functioning autism. Lorna divides her time between Edmonton and Penticton, where she and her husband share their homes with their crazy Mexican dog, Poncho,and a whiny bichon-shih tzu Molly. http://www.facebook.com/lorna.s.nicho...

David is a father of three little girls and an award-winning journalist turned author. He's published two middle-grade books for reluctant readers with a third expected in early 2018 for the Sports Stories series through Lorimer Kids and Teens. He enjoys trying to weave classic sports themes of teamwork, dedication, and loyalty alongside more challenging, modern-day topics (like race, culture, and class). It's all in hopes young readers can more easily identify with the characters they might be reading about in his books. When he's not making school lunches, dropping kids at school, picking kids up at school (or gymnastics or ballet or soccer or birthday parties)...he's trying to write and read as much as possible.

John Danakas was born in 1963 in Winnipeg, Manitoba, where he currently resides. John received a Bachelor of Arts (Honours) degree and a Master of Arts degree in English from the University of Manitoba. Aside from writing, he has been involved in the restaurant business, and has worked as a journalist and in public affairs. Although his greatest success has been writing "sports" novels for young readers, John also writes and has been published in a wide variety of other forms of fiction and non-fiction.

I was born in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. As a child, the fifth of seven, I immigrated with my family to Canada. We travelled by ship from Rotterdam to Halifax, then took the train West. In spite of a storm at sea, seasickness, eating dry bread and crackers for days, getting covered with soot on the train, for us children it was a wonderful trip. Our journey ended on a deserted farm near Edson, Alberta. We loved exploring the woods behind our house, getting water from a natural spring, picking wild flowers in the fields, gazing at the Rocky Mountains visible on the horizon, even the novelty of using an outhouse. That summer we didn't miss the big city of Amsterdam at all. Then school started. Suddenly we became aware we were odd ducks. Our clothes were different. We could barely speak or understand the language. I had always loved school, but now I developed stomach aches, headaches—anything to be allowed to stay home and skip school. We had a few very rough months. Fortunately, children learn a new language quickly, especially by immersion. By the time we moved to Edmonton a year later, my siblings and I could understand almost everything, speak English fairly well, read easy books, and even write the language. Spelling and grammar were the hardest subjects, but by then we were well on the way to becoming real little Canadians. Most of my schooling took place in Edmonton. Early on I knew I wanted to be a teacher, so I went to the University of Alberta and later to Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Michigan. I taught several years in Edmonton, then in Michigan, but most of my teaching career took place in Toronto. Teaching is a wonderful career. It is challenging, sometimes frustrating, but also rewarding. Children are constantly learning. They change. There are many opportunities to help them develop their skills and gifts. I tried to make the classroom an exciting place to be and to make learning fun. I loved books. While teaching at the Kindergarten and elementary school level, my awareness of children's literature grew. Having children of my own helped me value good stories even more. I enjoy making children aware of the richness of our language, of different ways of using language or telling a story. Eventually I began to write. Over the years I had many stories, poems, and articles published, but book manuscripts kept being returned. Also, while combining teaching with writing worked well as far as inspiration and subject matter was concerned, there was never enough time to keep at a project. A few years ago, while on sabbatical in England, I took a big step—I decided to quit teaching and write full time. My goal was finally to get some books published. Fortunately I did. I hope they are the first of many.

McPhee was educated at Caulfield Grammar School and Trinity College while studying at the University of Melbourne, where he earned his Bachelor of Arts and Master of Arts degrees, a Diploma in Education and a Doctor of Philosophy degree. He later taught at LaTrobe University (1975–79) and the Victoria University of Wellington (1980–86) before teaching history at Melbourne. He specialises in research on French history and the French Revolution, having published numerous books on the subject. His academic management positions at Melbourne have included working as Deputy Dean of the School of Graduate Studies, head of the Department of History and President of the university's academic board. In 2003 he became the deputy vice-chancellor for academics and in 2007 was appointed as the inaugural provost. As part of this role he has been responsible for planning and introducing the university's controversial new Melbourne Model, which is designed to maintain consistency with the Bologna Accords' structure for European higher education. In 2003 he was awarded the Centenary Medal for services to education. McPhee retired from the University of Melbourne on 14 June 2009 but continues to serve as a professorial fellow. In 2014 Peter McPhee, with the University of Melbourne and Coursera, developed a free online course on the French Revolution. The course follows the chapters in his eBook, The French Revolution.

When I'm not writing books, I'm editing Edify magazine in Edmonton. I am also a freelance writer, whose works has been published in more than 100 magazines, collections and newspapers worldwide. I am a freelance sports broadcaster, as well. I like to listen to very loud music when I write. Like Slayer.

Trevor Kew is a Canadian writer and translator who is the author of six children’s novels: Trading Goals (Lorimer, 2009), Sidelined (Lorimer, 2010), Breakaway (Lorimer, 2011), Playing Favourites (Lorimer, 2012), Bench Brawl (Lorimer, 2014), and Run for Your Life (Lorimer, 2017). Trevor was also a contributor to Tomo(Stone Bridge Press, 2012), an anthology of stories related to Japan which was designed to raise money for disaster relief efforts in the Tohoku region. He is currently represented by the Anne McDermid Agency. Born and raised in Rossland, British Columbia, Canada, Trevor holds a B.A. and a B.Ed. from the University of British Columbia. Since graduating in 2004, he has taught English literature and language in three countries – Canada, England and Japan – and traveled widely. He currently lives and works in Tokyo, Japan.

Dawn Hunter was born and raised in Toronto, Ontario, and is the youngest of three siblings. She and her sister have written two books together for young readers, one of which won a Canadian Children’s Book Centre Our Choice award in 2002. When she was young, Dawn wrote poems and stories, and she credits her mother for her love of words. Their trips to the library were a weekly adventure, and they often wrote stories together, too. Dawn loved to read fantasy novels, especially those written by Piers Anthony, but her favorite book was Jonathan Livingston Seagull. If her nose wasn’t buried in a book, you could usually find her drawing, swimming, riding her bike, or recording pretend radio programs with her best friend. After attending the University of Toronto and earning a science degree, Dawn became an editor. When she isn’t writing or editing, she enjoys walking her dogs, playing Wii games, and baking and decorating shaped cakes. The pirate ship cake she makes is one of her favorites. She also has a big art collection and enjoys finding works by new Canadian artists. Dawn still makes her home in Toronto, sharing it with her husband and five pets: three pugs and two cats. She hopes to continue writing books for young people.