Rachel Poliquin grew up in the country collecting curious bits of nature. She once wrote a small book about seahorses, but she lost it. She has a PhD in the history of science and a background in visual arts, museums studies and natural history. ~ ~She writes about animals, mostly. She is the author of Beastly Puzzles: A Brain-Boggling Animal Guessing Game, The Superpower Field Guides (about unexpected animal heroes), and the Polite Predator series (containing very good advice on how not to get eaten by hungry snakes and hyenas). She lives in Vancouver with her husband and three children.~Instagram: @rachelpoliquin~Twitter: @ravishingbeasts

Alan Cross is an internationally known broadcaster, interviewer, writer, consultant, blogger and speaker.#In his forty years in the broadcast and music business, Alan has interviewed the biggest names in rock, ranging from David Bowie and Ringo Starr to U2, Pearl Jam, Coldplay, the Red Hot Chili Peppers, AC/DC and the Foo Fighters.#He’s perhaps best known as a musicologist and documentarian on his long-running syndicated radio show, The Ongoing History of New Music. The program began in 1993 and so far, there are nearly 1000 one-hour episodes. Podcasts of those programs have been downloaded 12 million times around the world.#During his five-year tenure as program director of 102.1 the Edge/Toronto, he was named Program Director of the Year three times at the Canadian Music Awards.#Outside of radio, Alan’s résumé includes four books; dozens of public speaking engagements (TEDx, Ad Age and TD Financial among them); a series of national music columns; voicework for commercials; and content creation for TV, movies, record labels, artist management companies and streaming music services like Spotify, Songza and YouTube. He’s also a frequent guest commentator/analyst on a myriad of media outlets.#In 2011, Alan toured with William Shatner as part of a stage production called As Time Flies. He also was instrumental in creating content for a travelling science museum exhibit called The Science of Rock ’n’ Roll – which, by the way, was the genesis of The Science of Sound.#Alan is also sought after as a consultant for radio content. His current client is Corus Radio Toronto (102.1 the Edge and Q107). One of his companies, Major League Mixes, provided music advice for professional sports teams like the Toronto Maple Leafs.#Alan has been deeply involved exploring the past, present and future relationships between music, technology and social networking.#Alan is originally from Stonewall, Manitoba.~Twitter: @alancross~Instagram: @alancrossx~Facebook: @alancross

Inna Gertsberg grew up in the Soviet Union, a big country that no longer exists. As a kid, Inna loved to draw, and often created her own illustrations for the books she read. When she was a teenager, Inna’s family moved to Chicago where she studied art and decorated ice cream cakes to pay for her art supplies and tuition. After graduating, Inna worked in advertising as an art director and writer – a job that took her all over the world. Inna finally settled in Toronto, where she now lives with her two sons and a cat.#When she is not writing stories or making children’s books, Inna brings to life people’s imaginary monsters in her Draw Me a Monster project. Inna has drawn monsters for people in Australia, Canada, Spain, Mexico, Japan, Israel, France, England, Italy, China and many other parts of the world. She hopes to someday draw a monster for people from every single country.#Inna is an avid rock climber and a big fan of public transit.~Facebook: facebook.com/drawmymonster~Instagram: @drawmeamonster

Shannon Hunt grew up on a small sailboat in the Caribbean, a circumstance she blames for her aversion to all exercise except swimming and her ability to tell her stern from her bow – admittedly, not a particularly useful life skill. After an unusually long (ten-year) stopover in Florida, her parents packed up and moved home to Canada, settling on a small island in British Columbia. While taking a water taxi to high school every day was cool, making new friends in grade 12 was not, so she spent lots of time by herself writing stories and articles, some of which were published in the local newspaper.#After graduation, Shannon moved to a larger island (the 43rd largest in the world to be exact) and worked her way through bachelor’s and master’s degrees at the University of Victoria, pausing for an eight-month long stint in Barcelona where she practiced her Spanish, wrote more stories and ate lots of paella.#After university, Shannon was roped into starting up a kids’ science magazine, YES Mag, by a computer engineering grad who dreamed of making science and engineering interesting and entertaining. Over the course of fifteen years, they started a second magazine, KNOW, and won awards, including the Distinguished Young Alumni Award from the University of Victoria, the Eve Savory Award for Science Communication from the BC Innovation Council, the Michael Smith Award for Science Promotion from Canada’s Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC), and the Periodical of the Year from the Association of Educational Publishers.#Shannon is a co-editor of the non-fiction titles The Amazing International Space Station, Fantastic Feats and Failures, Science Detectives, Hoaxed!, and Robots, and the author of the fiction title Peril on Pender.#She lives in Victoria, British Columbia with her husband, two awesome kids and a crazy labradoodle – who all engineer equal parts magic and mayhem into her life.

Mireille Messier is a Montreal-born, Ottawa-raised and now Toronto-based children’s writer with a background in broadcasting and theater. Before becoming an author, Mireille worked as a television and radio host, a director, a researcher, a book reviewer and a voice actress. Sometimes, she still does those things, too. One of her first “literary” jobs was writing jokes for the bottom of pudding lids!#Since the launch of her first book in 2003, Mireille has published over twenty books. When she’s not at her computer writing, she thinks up new stories while she walks, drives or sails her big old boat. #Mireille loves doing author visits. On average, she meets about three thousand kids a year … give or take a thousand. Some of the funniest questions she has been asked by students are: “Do you dream in French?” (Yes!), “How many minutes does it take you to write a book?” (About a million!) and “Are any of the characters in your books real?” (Yes, they are often different versions of me and the people I know).#Mireille lives in Toronto with her husband, two wonderful teenage daughters and two extremely fluffy cats.