Johanna Spyri

Johanna Spyri (1827-1901) was born in rural Switzerland to a doctor and a poet. She later moved to Zurich to go to school. After marrying and having a son, she began writing stories later in life. She published her most famous novel, Heidi, in 1881. It has been translated from German into over fifty languages and over fifty million copies have been sold worldwide. In the last twenty years of her life, Spyri wrote more than fifty novels and stories for adults and children.

Veera Hiranandani, author of the Newbery Honor-winning The Night Diary, earned her MFA in creative writing at Sarah Lawrence College. She is also the author of The Whole Story of Half a Girl, which was named a Sydney Taylor Notable Book and a South Asia Book Award Finalist, and the chapter book series, Phoebe G. Green. A former book editor at Simon & Schuster, she now teaches creative writing at Sarah Lawrence College's Writing Institute and is working on her next novel.