Jeremy Strong is one of the UK’s highest profile authors for young readers and has a particular gift for humour which has seen him crowned Puffin’s King of Comedy.

He worked as a Head teacher before writing full-time and he has won a raft of awards including the Red House Children’s Book Award. He lives in Bath

Alex Hay grew up in Cambridge and Cardiff and has been writing as long as he can remember. He studied History at the University of York, and wrote his dissertation on female power at royal courts, combing the archives for every scrap of drama and skulduggery he could find.

He has worked in magazine publishing and the charity sector, and is a graduate of the Curtis Brown Write Your Novel course. The Housekeepers is his debut novel and won the Caledonia Novel Award 2022. Alex lives with his husband in South East London

Julia Donaldson is a top selling author of children’s books with over 65 million books sold worldwide. Among her greatest successes are Room on the Broom, The Gruffalo and Stick Man (all illustrated by Axel Scheffler), What the Ladybird Heard (illustrated by Lydia Monks) and The Giant Jumperee (illustrated by Helen Oxenbury). Julia’s books have been translated into over 72 languages.

Julia lives in the UK with her husband Malcolm and divides her time between Sussex in the South and Edinburgh in Scotland. From 2011 to 2013, she was the UK Children’s Laureate. Julia writes fiction, poems, plays and songs, as well as picture books. The TV films of The Gruffalo and Room on the Broom have both been nominated for Oscars.

Kate Simpson grew up on a diet of Little Women, Anne of Green Gables and anything written by Enid Blyton, but it didn't occur to her to try her own hand at writing children's books until she was in her thirties. Now she's hooked, and with two small children of her own, she finds she's never short of inspiration.

As well as being a picture book author and incurable bookworm, Kate is also a co-host of the children's book podcast One More Page, where she happily spends an hour a fortnight interviewing fellow book-folk and talking all things children's books.

Escaped teacher, now writing for children with 46 books published so far, ranging from early reading material to teenage novels. I've written 4 books for Franklin Watts, 4 for Wayland and one for Hodder.

I'm married with two grown up children and five grandchildren, no pets, though I used to have three beautiful cats, guinea pigs and rabbits. When I was a child, we kept chickens and I loved them, too.

I always have my nose in a book. I read both adult's and children's books. My favourite children's books include The Railway Children by E Nesbit, Journey to the River Sea by Eva Ibbotson, River on the Say by Philippa Pearce. My adult reading varies from Charles Dickens to many modern authors. I enjoy listening to music, classical, jazz and some pop.