Meet our creators!
Giuseppe Poli
Young Giuseppe has been on many imaginary adventures but the ones he enjoyed the most were the ones he shared with others. Giuseppe has had adventures with film makers, computer games, and IT though on all those travels he’s found he’s missed one thing - making his own adventures to share with others.
Giuseppe is the illustrator of Oliver's Grumbles by Yvonne Mes, and Young MacDonald is Giuseppe’s debut adventure as an Author AND Illustrator! Giuseppe can’t wait to share some more amazing, fantastical, hilarious, incredible adventures for you to enjoy!
Find out more about Giuseppe's work at his website.
Yvonne Mes
Yvonne Mes is a children’s author and illustrator from Brisbane. She writes fiction and non-fiction in the form of picture books, junior fiction and short stories. Her stories playfully expand perspectives and invite feelings. Yvonne coordinates Write Links, the Brisbane children's writers group supported by Book Links (Qld) Inc and is a member of SCBWI and several other professional writing bodies. Yvonne grew up in Amsterdam but has made her home in Australia. Her three sons make sure she is never lost for inspiration. Yvonne's first book with Yellow Brick Books is Oliver's Grumbles.
Find out more about Yvonne's work at her website.
Lynn Ward
Lynn Ward is a children’s author from New South Wales. She grew up in the country and loves living in a small town where she can see the stars at night. Lynn writes picture books and she loves rhyming and making reading fun for children. In her spare time she is a journalist for a country newspaper, a freelance editor, a grandmother to a brood of grandchildren and a mum to four grown-up kids. Her books include Grumpy Bear, Grouchy Bear; Sally Snickers Knickers; The Big Beet; and No Room for a Wombat.
Monty Lee
Monty Lee is a Brisbane-based artist who has been making illustrations since she could walk. Both her parents are artists and were determined to hand down their passion for art to their young children. Monty's urge to create through printmaking, painting and drawing were thus instilled in her from a very early age.
Travelling through many different jobs in her life, she maintained her interest in printmaking and illustrating. Monty created the illustrations for Songs to Edward Lear by Sjef Frenken. Monty lives with her husband, two children and a dog. She is determined to hand down her passion for art just as her parents did. She is the illustrator for Grumpy Bear, Grouchy Bear by Lynn Ward.
Sigi Cohen
Sigi Hallis Cohen hails from Port Elizabeth, South Africa, and now lives in Perth, Western Australia. He is an avid writer with a compulsion for matching words that rhyme. When not writing children’s verse, Sigi works as a lawyer which he says greatly alleviates the stresses of writing children’s picture books.
He is the author of My Dead Bunny, which was short-listed for the 2016 Children’s Book Council of Australia Picture Book of the Year Award and received Honours in the 2017 KOALA Awards. He also wrote Filthy Fergal.
Sona Babajanyan
Sona is an artist and illustrator from Armenia, living in Brisbane since 2008. She has been working as a translator of literature, editor, and graphic designer, and it was not until moving to Australia when she finally decided to focus all her attention on art and illustration. This was a decision she never regretted. Since that time she has illustrated a number of children’s picture books and realized that she loved it – looking at the world with a child’s eyes again. Sona’s works are full of subtle humour, poetry and magic. She works in traditional as well as digital media, both in colour and black-and-white. Most recently, Sona illustrated Filthy Fergal by Sigi Cohen.
Ann-Marie Finn
Ann-Marie Finn is an illustrator and author of children's books. She lives in Brisbane with her two young boys who inspire new stories and ideas every day. She started her career in the UK, but migrated to warmer climates in 2007 and is now a happy Australian. She has a growing collection of children's books to her name, including A Trip to the Moon, Captain Kieron, I Despair of my Hair and Gus the Asparagus. She is also the illustrator of Harrison's Song, Eric Finds a Way, Lulu and My Brother Tom.
Find out more about Ann-Marie's work at her website.
Heather Neilly
Heather Neilly is a writer, scientist and lover of the wild. She is the author of Who’s Making That Noise? with Anil Tortop. She works as an ecologist, studying the relationships between native plants and animals, and working to restore degraded ecosystems. She currently lives in the Riverland region of South Australia with her husband, two daughters and red dog Cliff. Her new book is Barefoot Bea.
Find out more about Heather's work at her website.
Ruth de Vos
Ruth is an illustrator and textile artist in Perth, Western Australia. Ruth has been absorbed in drawing and artmaking since childhood, but especially since the first of her six children was born in 2003. Ruth loves to celebrate the small, ordinary things of life in her artwork, which is why much of her work aims to capture the joy of little children discovering this wonderful world in which we live. Ruth works in a combination of digital and traditional media.
Ruth is the illustrator of Barefoot Bea, written by Heather Neilly. This is her first time working as a picture book illustrator.
Find out more about Ruth's work at her website.
Kate Gordon
Kate Gordon grew up in a small town by the sea in Tasmania. She is the author of five books for young adults.
Sandy Flett
Sandy Flett is an illustrator and cartoonist who lives in the beautiful countryside of New England, NSW. She creates her hilariously kooky characters, pictures and stories in her art studio while listening to sheep baa and cows moo very loudly outside her window.
Sandy is the illustrator of Juno Jones, Word Ninja and is also the creator and presenter of her very own YouTube Channel Kids Art School, which is loved by kids across the world.
Find out more about Sandy's work at her website.