• Age: 6 to 8
• Grade: 1 to 3
• Reading age: 6 to 8

Long, long ago, Johnny's grandpa found a bottle on the beach. When Johnny roots it out of the back of Grandpa's closet, he can see a mysterious shadow through the green glass. "We should break it," Johnny says. "Maybe later," says his grandpa. And so the story begins.

I was born in East York in 1948, the daughter of a Canadian soldier and his Dutch war bride. I graduated from the University of Toronto and became a teacher of lots of things, but mostly of art and English. I guess I have taught thousands of Toronto's great kids over the years and they have taught me too.As a child I read widely. I liked all sorts of fairy tales and animal stories by authors like the Brothers Grimm and Thornton Burgess. Maida's Little Shop by Inez Haynes Irwin was also a favourite. I have two children, Katie and Mackenzie, who gave me ideas for stories while they were growing up. Kate had a little plastic guy and I wrote a set of books about this toy from two different perspectives. Sometimes I get ideas from things I do. I like to build sand sculptures on beaches and I wrote a picture book once about finding a dragon shape in the sand. Other ideas seem to fall into my lap when I'm busy with something else. If I don't commit those to paper right away, they vanish. I'd like to do some art for one of my books. Sometimes when I can't sleep, I draw or paint a bit of a scene from one of my stories. Maybe I'll be brave enough to submit these to a publisher one day. I still live in Toronto, in a little bungalow with lots of big maples and a skunk or two. Mackenzie is here with his dog, and my daughter Katie often comes to visit.

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GABRIELLE GRIMARD a illustré plus de 30 albums, dontLes mots volés, Quand j’avais huit ans, Fatima et les voleurs de clémentines, Aujourd'hui peut-être... et les livres de la série Petit Gnouf. Elle est aussi l'auteure-illustratrice de l'album Lila et la corneille. Gabrielle habite aux environs de Montréal.

From the time she was little GABRIELLE GRIMARD loved art, dismaying her elementary school teachers by constantly drawing in class. Later Gabrielle studied art in high school and university. After her son was born, she began illustrating children’s books and has now created more than 25, including When I Was Eight (Quand j'avais huit ans), Stolen Words (Les mots volés) and Not My Girl (Où est ma fille?). Lila and the Crow (Lila et la corneille) is the first book she both wrote and illustrated. She uses watercolours, gouache and oil to create images of amazing warmth and depth. Gabrielle lives near Montreal, QC. Visit her at https://www.gabriellegrimard.com.

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