John Steven Gurney

John Steven Gurney is the author and illustrator of picture books Dinosaur Train and The Bossy Pirate, and the graphic novels Fuzzy Baseball, and Ninja Baseball Blast (Fuzzy Baseball 2). Dinosaur Train was inspired by his young son Jesse's obsession with both trains and dinosaurs. It depicts a child's fanciful journey on an oversized train operated by colorful dinos. The Bossy Pirate is about a boy learning not to be too controlling while playing imaginatively with his friends.

In John's graphic novel Fuzzy Baseball, he combines his love of creating funny animals with his love of baseball. In Ninja Baseball Blast the Fuzzies have a wacky away game against the Sashimi City Ninjas.

John has illustrated over 150 books for children. He is the illustrator of some of America's most popular chapter books series. Among these are Random House's The A to Z Mysteries and Scholastic's The Bailey School Kids, and Big Apple Barn. His latest series is The Calendar Mysteries, an offshoot of The A to Z Mysteries, featuring the younger siblings of Josh and Ruth Rose.

John grew up in Bucks County Pennsylvania. His first and greatest inspirations were Dr. Seuss and Maurice Sendak. As he approached fifth grade his influences switched to Bugs Bunny cartoons and Mad Magazine. He studied art at Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, NY for his undergraduate degree, and received an MFA in Illustration from The University of Hartford. He lived in NYC until 1997, when he moved to Brattleboro, Vermont where he currently lives with his wife. When he is not writing and illustrating he travels around the country sharing his creative process with school children. Since 2002 he has traveled to schools in 31 countries and 6 countries to share his author presentation.