Joan C. Waites has been a freelance illustrator for the past
fifteen years. She received a bachelor of science degree from DeSales University in 1982 and then worked for fifteen years as a neonatal intensive care nurse in Philadelphia and Washington, D.C., while she simultaneously returned to college
to study illustration and launch her freelance career. Her illustration studies were completed at George Washington University, the Corcoran School of Art, the Maryland College of Art and Design, and the Maryland Institute College of Art, where she received a certificate of illustration in 1990.
While the majority of her work has been commissioned for the children's market, she also has experience in textile and surface design, medical illustration, and advertising art. To date she has illustrated more than thirty-five books for the educational and trade marketplace, several children's
magazines, and poster art.
Mrs. Waites illustrated another
Pelican Publishing book, Moon's Cloud Blanket, which was
selected for an IRA/CBC Children's Choices Program 2004 Selection. She has also been awarded a prestigious Benjamin Franklin Award (2001) and the Educational Press Award from Hopskotch magazine for her illustrations and has been featured in The Children's Writer's and Illustrator's Market Place,
published by Writer's Digest Books.
Mrs. Waites lives and works in
Silver Spring, Maryland, with her husband, Gerard, and their three children, Taylor Anne, Caitrin, and Haley.