Elizabeth Enright (1909-1968) grew up in New York in a family of artists. She spent her childhood drawing pictures and created both art and story for her first book, Kintu: A Congo Adventure, published in 1935. She later decided that she preferred writing to illustrating and went on to write many enduringly popular books, including a series about the Melendy family in The Saturdays, three other novels, and two long fairy tales, Tatsinda and Zeee. She won numerous awards, including the Newbery Medal for Thimble Summer (1938) and a Newbery Honor for Gone-Away Lake (1957).