Loreto Todd is Professor of English at the University of Ulster, Coleraine. Born in Northern Ireland, she attended Queen's University, Belfast where her classmates included poet Seamus Heaney and writer Seamus Deane. She worked in England for many years, and was director of the programme of World English Research at the University of Leeds, England.

She has travelled extensively and lectured in Africa, America (North and South), Asia (India and Singapore), Australia (Brisbane and Sydney), the Caribbean and the Pacific (Hawaii, Solomans, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea). She has written 30 books, over 80 articles and chapters in books; over 100 reviews, short papers and has edited several journals.

During her travels, she has amassed a collection of texts, as well as audio and audio-visual recordings, from around the world. These total in excess of 12 million words and include: Conversations; Descriptions of language choice and use; Oral and written literature. She is currently working on this archive material and translating the Pidgin and Creole texts.

Patrick Touher trained as a Baker Confectioner whilst in Artane Industrial School and worked as such upon leaving the school at age sixteen. Patrick travelled extensively from the sixties through to the early seventies. In 1972 he married his wife Pauline and they had three children together.

Carol Ann Treacy is an Irish children’s author, illustrator and graphic designer. She lives in Kilkenny in a very messy house with her husband, two children and a bunch of wild cats; She loves to travel and sometimes wishes she could fly. She thinks geese are great. Honk!

William Trevor has received world wide acclaim for his novels, short stories and plays and is the winner of many major literary awards. He was born in Mitchelstown, County Cork, in 1928, where his father was a bank manager. When he was growing up, the family lived in many different towns in Ireland.

Trevor's Ballroom of Romance is well known from its filmed version. His novel Old Boys won the Hawthornden Prize, Angel at the Ritz the Royal Society of Literature Award, The Children of Dynmouth and Fools of Fortune each won the Whitbread Award. Reading Turgenev was shortlisted for the Booker Prize. Trevor also won the Sunday Times Award for Literary Excellence in 1992. His most recent book, The Story of Lucy Gault, was also a Booker Prize winner.

Juliet's Story is his only book for children.