New York Times best-selling author Carole Boston Weatherford's 60-plus books include the Caldecott Honor book Unspeakable: The Tulsa Race Massacre, for which she was awarded the Coretta Scott King Author Award and a Sibert Honor; the Newbery Honor winner Box; and the Caldecott Honor winners Freedom in Congo Square, Fannie Lou Hamer, and Moses. She won a Coretta Scott King Author Honor for Becoming Billie Holiday. Weatherford teaches at Fayetteville State University in North Carolina.

E. B. Lewis, award-winning illustrator and fine artist, has illustrated over seventy books for children, including The Other Side by Jacqueline Woodson and Lizzie Demands a Seat by Beth Anderson. After his graduation from the Temple University Tyler School of Art, Lewis taught art in public schools for twelve years. Presently, he teaches at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts.