Vila Gingerich grew up in Mennonite communities across the Midwest. She spent seven years doing volunteer work in Romania and now lives on fifty acres in Missouri with her husband, cats, and an overgrown veggie garden. She was a winner of the 2014 Highlights for Children fiction contest and her work has been published in Highlights for Children and Purpose magazines. Vila is the author of two middle-grade novels, both loosely based on her childhood—Growing Toward the Sun and Full Moon, Half a Heart\—as well as a memoir anthology titled White Horse to Bucharest: Lessons Romania Taught Us. Vila teaches sixth through eighth grades in a private Mennonite school. She tells her students that everyone has a special talent, good books take you places, and sometimes it’s okay to add on your fingers.