Harry Cat and Tucker Mouse: Tucker's Beetle Band

Thea Feldman has written and edited hundreds of children’s books, including Suryia and Roscoe and Suryia Swims!, which she co-authored with Dr. Bhagavan Antle. She has also worked at the Wildlife Conservation Society where she researched and wrote about the animals in the Society's five urban wildlife parks in New York City. She is a former editorial director at Scholastic.

George Selden (1929-1989) was the author of A Cricket in Times Square, winner of the 1961 Newbery Honor and a timeless children's classic. Born in Hartford, Connecticut, Selden received his B.A. from Yale, where he was a member of the Elizabethan Club and contributed to the literary magazine. He spent three summer sessions at Columbia University and, after college, studied for a year in Rome on a Fulbright Scholarship. People often asked Selden how he got the idea for The Cricket in Times Square. "One night I was coming home on the subway, and I did hear a cricket chirp in the Times Square subway station. The story formed in my mind within minutes. An author is very thankful for minutes like those, although they happen all too infrequently." The popular Cricket series grew to seven titles, including Tucker's Countryside and The Old Meadow. In 1973, The Cricket in Times Square was made into an animated film. Selden wrote more than fifteen books, as well as two plays. His storytelling blends the marvelous with the commonplace realities of life, and it was essential to him that his animal characters display true emotions and feelings.

GEORGE SELDEN (1929-1989) wrote not only the adventures of Chester, Harry, Tucker, and their friends but also The Genie of Sutton Place, which was one of School Library Journal's Best Books of the Year.

GARTH WILLIAMS (1912-1996) illustrated all of George Selden's Chester Cricket books. His other distinguished work includes Charlotte's Web, Stuart Little, and the Little House books.

THEA FELDMAN is the author of numerous books for children, including Suryia and Roscoe, which she co-authored with Dr. Bhagavan Antle, available in Spring 2011 from Henry Holt BYR.

OLGA and ALEKSEY IVANOV are the illustrators of many children's books, including the Charlotte's Web beginning readers in which they also replicated the style of Garth Williams.

Garth Williams (1912-96) illustrated all seven of the Chester Cricket books and many other works, including Stuart Little and Charlotte's Web.

Kathleen McInerney has narrated numerous audiobooks by bestselling authors such as Emily Giffin, Danielle Steel, Jeffrey Stepakoff, Mary Kay Andrews, and Linda Castillo. Her narration of Just One Day by Gayle Forman won an AudioFile Earphones Award. In reviewing Mary Kay Andrew’s Ladies’ Night, AudioFile magazine said, “McInerney makes each of the characters distinct and recognizable and gives each the perfect voice, accent, and vocal mannerisms. Most enjoyable and well performed.”

 She has appeared onstage in New York and around the United States in both classical and contemporary theater. Her credits also include television commercials, daytime drama, radio plays, and animation voice-overs.