The Serpent Came to Gloucester

M.T. Anderson is the author of the celebrated picture book biography Handel, Who Knew What He Liked, illustrated by Kevin Hawkes. He is also the author of several young adult novels, most recently Feed, a National Book Award Finalist and winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize. Considering the existence of sea serpents, he says, "For generations, fishermen in places as distant as New England and Norway took for granted the existence of long snakelike animals in the North Atlantic. It takes a peculiar kind of snobbery to believe that men who worked on the sea all their lives — though illiterate — were by nature superstitious, confused, and gullible. Unlike those people who have seen Bigfoot. Whew, what a bunch of lunatics!" M.T. Anderson currently serves on the faculty at Vermont College's MFA Program in Writing for Children.

Bagram Ibatoulline was born in Russia, graduated from the State Academic Institute of Arts in Moscow, and has worked in the fields of fine arts, graphic arts, mural design, and textile design. He is the illustrator of several children's picture books, including Crossing by Philip Booth, named an American Library Association Notable Children's Book, The Animal Hedge by Paul Fleischman, a Publishers Weekly Best Children's Book of the Year, and, most recently, Hana In the Time of the Tulips Deborah Noyes.