With the same sense of adventure that is often seen in her picture book stories, Barbara McClintock set off at age 20 to become a children’s book artist. Encouraged by an art professor, she called the well-known illustrator Maurice Sendak to ask him what to do. Helpful and supportive, Sendak told her how to put together a book dummy and suggested she move to New York.

Within several months of that move, she had her first book contract, though she acknowledges that she was very lucky and the first few years in New York were difficult. In the early years she illustrated the “Fraggle Rock” books based on Jim Henson’s Muppets. She spent some time in Paris researching two mystery stories, written by James Duffy, about a character named May Gray, a poodle police officer. That setting would show up many times in her future work, including several award-winning titles.

McClintock’s illustrations are meticulous in their detail. They have a pleasing old-fashioned look that reflects her appreciation of nineteenth century artists such as Grandville, Daumier, Doré, Cruikshank, and Caldecott. With a delicate line and colorful palette, her settings and characters seem to take on a life of their own. Four of McClintock’s books have been

cited in the New York Times Best Illustrated Books: The Heartaches of a French Cat, The Fantastic Drawings of Danielle, The Gingerbread Man (retold by Jim Aylesworth), and Adèle & Simon. Three of these express her love of the city of Paris – Adèle & Simon even features endpapers with a detailed map of Paris sites – and The Fantastic Drawings of Danielle also echoes McClintock’s early years as the daughter of a photographer.

A number of McClintock’s books are based on folk tales, such as the award-winning Gingerbread Boy, which is retold with a wry twist by Jim Aylesworth. McClintock herself adapted the text for her version of Cinderella, a Golden Kite award-winner for illustration. Animal Fables from Aesop was named an ALA Notable Children’s Book and adapted to the stage by the Minneapolis Children’s Theater that produced it as a ballet/opera. McClintock has also designed sets and costumes for that same theater’s production of The Twelve Dancing Princesses.

Dahlia, with its tomboy heroine Charlotte, received a Boston Globe-Horn Book Honor Award in the picture book category. Many of McClintock’s books have been chosen for Parents’ Choice Awards, School Library Journal’s Best of the Year lists, and New York Public Library’s 100 Titles for Reading and Sharing. Several of her books have been translated and published in German, French, and Korean. Her artwork has also appeared in The New York Times and The New Yorker.