Peter McMahon knew he wanted to be a writer by grade 10, the year he started working for his high school paper in Peterborough, Ontario. In 1996, he was accepted into the journalism program at Toronto’s Ryerson University. Since then, Peter has written and produced for some of Canada’s largest media outlets, including CTV, the Toronto Star, the kids magazine YES Mag and Discovery Channel, where he spent seven years as a new media producer and later, senior online producer.~While at Discovery, Peter pioneered the first TV-quality live webcasts of science events online. Serving as producer, editor and sometimes host, the productions ranged from live video coverage of the 2007 lunar eclipse to the 2008 university concrete canoe challenge (co-hosted by Survivorman’s Les Stroud and canoe author Kevin Callan), to the FIRST Robotics Canadian championships, to a generation-3 night-vision webcast of the Perseid meteor shower — from inside a meteor crater!~As a science journalist, Peter has travelled the world and met some fascinating people: He has covered a space shuttle launch at Cape Canaveral, Florida; helped unearth the bones of a giant carnivorous tyrannosaur in the Alberta badlands; witnessed the reconstruction of a 400-year-old sunken warship in Sweden; walked along the path of a photon in a particle accelerator; and travelled 2 km (4 CN towers!) underground in search of the universe’s missing mass.~In his travels, he has met and interviewed “science celebrities” from primate researcher Jane Goodall to James Watson (co-discoverer of the structure of DNA) to Anousheh Ansari (the world’s first female space tourist). He has interviewed “daredevil billionaire” Sir Richard Branson and dozens of American and Canadian astronauts; and he has also worked with science hosts Jay Ingram, Ziya Tong, Natasha Stillwell and sometimes-host of Daily Planet and Daily Planet specials Ed Robertson.~Since leaving Discovery and CTV full-time in 2009, Peter has gone on to cover the health science of the Olympics at the Vancouver 2010 Winter Games for CTVolympics.ca ~He is currently working on a number of writing projects with magazines, web sites and the federal government, as well as a series of books on vehicles of the future for Kids Can Press.~The ideas for the experiments in his books come from years of creating such activities for hands-on children’s science programs at museums. While working on his latest book, Peter tested his experiments out in the “lab” of his children’s programs, getting feedback on what rocks, what doesn’t and having a lot of fun along the way.~An avid backyard astronomer, Peter writes, produces and speaks on topics from do-it-yourself science, to science promotion in Canada, to wilderness stargazing, to space tourism and our future in the cosmos.

Kyo is a self-professed spork — her father is British and her mother is Japanese. She was born in England, where she enjoyed a brief theatrical career in London’s West End. Little did she know when she appeared in The King and I that her one line — “I believe in snow” — would be prophetic. At age four, in the midst of a very snowy winter, she and her parents moved to Toronto, Canada. #Later Kyo attended university, where she did not study dentistry or architecture (much to the great vexation and sorrow of her parents), but instead pursued a degree in Art History. She followed this degree with another vexing degree in Cultural Studies (her poor parents). Alas, though she acquired several useful skills as a longtime student (e.g. pencil sharpening, binder organization and laundry folding), neither degree led to particularly enriching employment. This is just as well because there is nothing like being hungry and bored and underemployed to fire up one’s imagination.#Kyo now resides in Toronto, where she shares a home with two children, a cat, a musician and a lot of books. In addition to writing, she likes to listen to music, watch old movies, do yoga, make art and play around in her bright, open kitchen. Spork, the story of a mixed kitchen utensil and Kyo’s debut book for children, was originally conceived with her husband to celebrate the birth of their first child. As well as writing for children, Kyo is a novelist and a visual-arts writer.

Dianne Young is, in alphabetical order, an educational assistant in an elementary school, in her fifties, a mother, a wife, a writer and a yodeller. She was born and raised in Saskatchewan, albeit in many different communities. She now lives in Martensville, which is a small city just north of Saskatoon.#Dianne has been writing for children for over twenty years. Her first book, The Abaleda Voluntary Firehouse Band, was published in 1990. Her fifth book, Dear Flyary, is her most recent (and time-consuming) endeavour — she worked on the story for almost nineteen years! Yes, she is persistent. She’s also easygoing and likes to laugh.#Dianne loves reading and writing and learning new things. Recently she learned Braille so that she could work with students who are blind or visually impaired. She has also started photographing birds. So what’s next? Dianne has always wanted to learn to play the banjo, speak Spanish, draw and … and … and … Who knows!

Catherine Rondina is a freelance writer-researcher with over 1,700 published articles and eight books to her credit. Born in Toronto, Ontario, she grew up in a household of avid readers.#Catherine also credits her love of reading to her inspirational elementary school teacher, Mrs. D., at Jackman Avenue Public School. A one time reluctant reader, Mrs. D. was able to select just the right book, E.B. White’s, Charlotte’s Web, that captured Catherine’s imagination and made her want to become a writer herself.#So, it seemed only natural for Catherine to take her love of books, reading and writing with her throughout her life.#She has spent over twenty-six years working with the Toronto Public Library in many different facets from children and young adult services to literacy and film.#She began her own writing career in the late 1980s in the magazine and newspaper trade. Her work has appeared in publications such as the Toronto Star, Canadian Living, Modern Woman, Cottage Life and the Toronto Sun. Catherine has written monthly columns for Good Times, City Parent and Post City Magazines. Her writing for children, from grades 3 to 12, has been published by Nelson Education Ltd., Pearson Education Canada, Prentice Hall Ginn, Gage Educational Publishing and Owl Communications, including two educational workbooks for Nelson Literacy, Literacy Power A and Literacy Power G.#Catherine has also published three children’s books for James Lorimer & Company: Lying: Deal With It Straight Up! (2006), Rudeness: Deal With It If You Please (2005) and Gossip: Deal With It Before Word Gets Around (2004). In April of 2008, she published The 10 Worst Things About the Internet for Rubicon/Scholastic. Kids Can Press published her latest book, Don’t Touch That Toad & Other Strange Things Adults Tell You.#In addition to her writing, Catherine hosts numerous school and public library visits throughout southern Ontario. Her workshops are very well received by students and teachers alike. Catherine takes great pride in being able to curtail each workshop to the audience she is presenting to, whether it’s a public library program with over 150 young adults or a classroom setting of thirty-five grade 4 students.#At present, she teaches creative nonfiction for children at George Brown College in Toronto, Ontario. Catherine lives in Richmond Hill, Ontario, with her husband and three children.

Stacey Roderick is a children’s book editor and the author of Dinosaurs from Head to Tail, Ocean Animals from Head to Tail and Bugs from Head to Tail. She lives with her family in Toronto, Ontario.