Frances Figart grew up in eastern Kentucky where she learned to love living near wildlife. Always a writer and editor, she now directs the Creative Services department at Great Smoky Mountains Association and edits Smokies Life journal, the premier benefit for GSMA members. She is the editor of the 2019 GSMA title Back of Beyond: A Horace Kephart Biography, which won the Thomas Wolfe Memorial Literary Award that same year, and the author of two other books: a collection of autobiographical essays, Seasons of Letting Go: Most of What I Know about Truly Living I Learned by Helping Someone Die, and A Search for Safe Passage (2021), a Purple Dragonfly Award-winning book for young readers recognized as Publication of the Year by the Public Lands Alliance in 2022. Frances Figart writes a regular column for the Asheville Citizen Times and lives north of Asheville, North Carolina, in Flag Pond, Tennessee.Jesse White is an illustrator, author, and muralist creating whimsical, wonder-filled work that explores the power of imagination and adventure. Nature is a consistent backdrop for those explorations, a focus that stems from a childhood spent wandering the woods in rural North Carolina. Jesse earned a BFA in Studio Art from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a MA in Art Education from Virginia Commonwealth University. She taught elementary, middle, and high school art in Washington, DC, before beginning her journey as a freelance artist. Her first book, Brave Like Fireweed, is forthcoming from Union Square Kids in 2023. Jesse lives in Durham, North Carolina.
