MARIA VAN LIESHOUT was born and raised near Amsterdam, where she spent many weekends in a Museum Quarter row house with her artist aunt and metalsmith uncle. Drawing while her aunt painted, and pecking stories on a typewriter while her uncle soldered metals, inspired her love for creating. After high school, she studied visual communications at George Washington University in Washington, D.C. In 2000, she became an illustrator full-time. She has illustrated and written several picture books. Song of a Blackbird is her first graphic novel.