I was born in Lausanne, a small city in the French-speaking part of Switzerland, and moved to Sydney when I was three. Everyone in my family loves to read, and a lot of memories from my childhood involve books and writing—like my dad reading aloud to me (one of our favourites was Hand, Hand, Fingers, Thumb by Al Perkins & Eric Gurney), writing poetry for my mum, and reading Winnie the Pooh to my sister.

I spent nearly ten years working with some of Australia’s most talented children’s authors and illustrators before writing a book of my own, Kisses for Daddy, beautifully illustrated by David Legge. Our second collaboration, Parsley Rabbit’s Book about Books, won the Children’s Book Council of Australia’s Eve Pownall Award, and we toured our third book, Captain Crabclaw’s Crew, around every state in Australia. We are currently working on a fourth book together. My new picture book, A Rat in a Stripy Sock, has been illustrated by another David—my partner, David Francis. (It’s based on a true story!)

As well as continuing to write picture books, I have been working on a series of junior novels about two very unlikely superheroes, Extraordinary Ernie and Marvellous Maud, with the heroic illustrator Judy Watson. The fourth book in the series, Heroes of the Year, will be published in August 2011.

Another exciting project is the Gerander Trilogy. The first book, The Song of the Winns, came out in September 2010.

Fearless Frances Watts (right) and Jittery Judy Watson (below)