Cassandra Federman was born and raised in Massachusetts, where she spent her childhood reading comic books, playing action figures, drawing superheroes, and participating in all things nerdy (before that became cool). She graduated magna cum laude from Brandeis University, where she cofounded the Brandeis Comic Book Club. After college she moved to Los Angeles and worked in film and television. Over the course of her life, Cassandra has been many things—a hand model, a wrestler, a manatee rescuer, an actor, and a mystic wood elf—but her favorite so far has been a children’s book author-illustrator. Cassandra is the author-illustrator of the picture books This Is a Sea Cow and This Is a Seahorse, which received multiple starred reviews and won an ILA Children’s and Young Adults’ Book Award. She is also the author-illustrator of the graphic novel The Story Spinners. Visit her online at CassandraFederman.com.