Vacation Time

Nikki Giovanni (1943–2024), poet, activist, mother, grandmother, and educator, grew up in Tennessee and Ohio and graduated with honors from Fisk University in Nashville. The author of over thirty books, she was also the recipient of seven NAACP Image Awards, the Langston Hughes Medal for Outstanding Poetry, as well as thirty-one honorary degrees and an Emmy Award. She garnered her most unusual honor in 2007 when a South American bat species—Micronycteris giovanniae—was named in celebration of her. A devoted teacher, she spent thirty-five years as University Distinguished Professor of English at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Virginia. She was an honorary member of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc.

Marisabina Russo's warm, distinctive picture books usually mirror everyday scenarios from her own family's life. The Big Brown Box was inspired by her three children's tendency to entertain themselves—and each other—with common household objects (which included many a cardboard box).Ms. Russo has written and illustrated many picture books for children, and has illustrated several by other authors. She and her husband and children live in Westchester County, New York.