Gene Barretta grew up in Yardley, PA where he spent countless hours drawing, animating, making movies and building puppets with his brother, Bill. Before he began his career as an author and illustrator of children's books, he graduated from New York University with a BFA in Film Studies and worked for many years in film and television on both coasts. He has written and illustrated several books, both trade and mass-market, for such clients as Henry Holt & Co., Dutton, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Scholastic, HarperCollins, The Jim Henson Company and Between the Lions, among others.