My Beautiful Birds

Suzanne Del Rizzo has always loved getting her hands messy. She traded her job in scientific research for a career in children¿s illustration with her first picture book, Skink on the Brink, which won the SCBWI Crystal Kite Award and was a finalist for the Rainforest of Reading Award. Suzanne¿s dimensional illustrations use polymer clay and other mixed media to bring rich texture and imagination to her books. In 2015, looking for resources to explain the Syrian Civil War to her own children, Suzanne came across an article of a boy who took solace in a connection with wild birds at the Zäatari refugee camp. Struck by the universality of a child¿s relationship to animals, she began writing her New York Times Notable picture book My Beautiful Birds. Her distinctive illustrations also grace Sun Dog, a winner of the IODE Jean Throop Book Award, and Before You Were Born, an acclaimed and touching celebration of new life. Suzanne lives in Oakville, Ontario.