Joan Dunning, author and illustrator, is doing what she set out to do when she was six years old--- write and illustrate children's books. A graduate of UC Santa Barbara's College of Creative Studies in studio art (painting) and creative writing, Dunning wrote and illustrated her first book The Loon: Voice of the Wilderness in 1985. The book, an adult book that Dunning describes as one that can be enjoyed by the whole family, sold 125,000 copies, an incredible feat for a first time author.

After the success of her book, Dunning returned to her home state of California to live in Humboldt County, where she wrote her second book, (also appropriate for the whole family), Secrets of the Nest, about the nesting and chick-rearing of forty species of North American birds. Her third book, From the Redwood Forest, is an adult book about the redwoods in Humboldt County. In 2002, Leaving Home, written by Sneed Collard III, became the first children's book illustrated by Dunning. It is about the different ways animals leave home.

Dunning's love of nature was nurtured before she became a writer, by her father. Dunning's father, a photographer, spent a lot of time with her in the desert when she was young. "He instilled in me the habit of 'just watching' because that's what he did," she said. To this day, Dunning says she loves camping, backpacking and animals.

Dunning also said that writing and illustrating books has taught her how to finish things. "It's really hard to go into a contract with a book and come out on the other side with a product. It's an incredible pressure cooker and that pressure really brings out creativity. Even the commitment to write a book without a contract has pressure. The longer you've worked on a project, the more obligation you have to yourself to finish it."

• The Loon; Voice of the Wilderness
  Written and illustrated by Joan Dunning, Yankee Books, 1985

• Secrets of the Nest: The Family Life of North American Birds
  Written and illustrated by Joan Dunning, Houghton Mifflin Co., 1994

• From the Redwood Forest
  Written and illustrated by Joan Dunning, photographs by Doug Thron, Chelsea Green Publishing, 1998

• Leaving Home
  Written by Sneed Collard, III, Illustrated by Joan Dunning, Houghton Mifflin Co., 2002.