Twinkle Thinks Pink

Holabird, Katharine

Born: Cambridge, MA USA, Jan 23, 1948

Childhood spent in Chicago, IL with 3 sisters (and actress mother, architect father)

Jobs: magazine editor, nursery school teacher, freelance journalist, writer

Lives: North London, England and Water Mill, NY USA

First Book: Angelina Ballerina published 1983

Katharine grew up in an artistic household in Chicago, the 2nd of 4 daughters. As a child she lived in an imaginary world of fairy tales, princesses and ballerinas, and loved to put on plays and dances with her sisters.

Katharine received a BA in Literature from Bennington College in Vermont in 1969, and after graduation worked as a literary editor, then moved to Italy where she was a freelance journalist for 2 years.

In 1973 Katharine married and moved with her husband to London, where she became a nursery school teacher until the birth of their first daughter in 1976. Another daughter was born in 1979 and a son in 1983.

Katharine was already the mother of young children when she created Angelina Ballerina in 1982. "I wanted to write for all the children who love dance and drama, and my daughters were a great inspiration."

There are now over 20 books in print about the adventures of ballet mad Angelina, translated into over 15 languages. Angelina has danced in an animated TV series for several years, and has pirouetted into the limelight with the English National Ballet in two children's ballets based on the series. A new musical, "Angelina the Mousical", is touring the UK in 2012 and will head to the Peacock Theatre in London in 2013.

The Angelina books have won a collection of awards, including: the Kentucky Bluegrass Award for Angelina Ballerina in 1985; ALA Notable Book Awards in 1986 and 1987, a British Book Design and Production award in 1990. Angelina's Christmas was selected as the Child Study Association's Children's Book of the Year in 1987. "Angelina Ballerina's Invitation to the Ballet" won the Oppenheim