Mandana Talieh

THE AUTHOR:

Nels Hanson grew up on a small family farm in the San Joaquin Valley of California, and has worked as a farmer, teacher, and writer/editor. His fiction received the James D. Phelan Award from the San Francisco Foundation and four Pushcart Prize nominations, and his poetry the Prospero Prize from Sharkpack Review and a Pushcart and Best of the Web nominations. His novels and collections of short stories and poems can be found on Amazon. What the Lizard Said is the first in a series of Wise Dog & Jimmi books, and an illustrated children’s story, Julia and the Sea Bear, is nearing completion.

THE ILLUSTRATOR:

Mandana Talieh began drawing and painting from an early age -- her love of art led her to the creation of Wise Dog and Jimmi,

illustrated characters that first appeared in a line of greeting “wisdom” cards with lessons from I Am That: Talks with Sri

Nisargadatta Maharaj, a book that has guided her spirituality and artistic expression. Her animated short video “Tune In,” a

surreal cartoon set to rock music, was screened at film festivals across America. She lives on the Central Coast of California

where she paints and illustrates children’s stories and poems, and now What the Lizard Said, her first Wise Dog and Jimmi

book. An illustrated prose fairy tale of California and the Pacific Coast, Julia and the Sea Bear, is nearing completion.