Pat Zietlow Miller knew she wanted to be a writer ever since her seventh-grade English teacher read her paper about square-dancing skirts out loud in class and said: “This is the first time anything a student has written has given me chills.” 

Pat started out as a newspaper reporter and wrote about everything from dartball and deer-hunting to diets and decoupage. Then, she joined an insurance company and edited its newsletter and magazine.

Now, she’s a full-time children’s author with 20 books currently available and more under contract. Her first book, Sophie’s Squash, won the Golden Kite Award for best picture book text. It also won an Ezra Jack Keats New Writer Honor, a Charlotte Zolotow Honor and a Crystal Kite Award. Be Kind was on the New York Times bestseller list for 10 weeks, and In Our Garden was chosen for the Dolly Parton Imagination Library.

Pat has one wonderful husband, two delightful daughters and two pampered cats. She lives in Sun Prairie, Wisconsin.