Edwin Fotheringham spent his formative years in Sydney, Australia, and was educated at the University of Washington School of Art in Seattle, where he lives today with his family.

Mr. Fotheringham made a career change from fine artist/stockboy to illustrator in 1992. It was a golden moment in Seattle's pop-cultural history: the nation's psyche was focused on some grubby music types, and all that they touched. Having certain band members as housemates afforded Mr. Fotheringham the opportunity to illustrate their CD covers. With portfolio in hand, he seized the opportunity to make a trip to New York City while attention was high.

With commercial work that has addressed subjects and markets as varied as punk rock and Neiman Marcus, The New Yorker and Ladies' Home Journal, a Visa Card campaign and an elementary school auction, Mr. Fotheringham continues to enjoy solving visual problems with blotty lines.

Mr. Fotheringham has recently explored a related path, illustrating children's picture books. What To Do About Alice?, by Barbara Kerley, represents his first foray into this new genre. In what has turned out to be a fortunate pairing, the book has received five starred reviews, a 2008 Parents' Choice Approval, a 2008 Boston Globe-Horn Book Non Fiction Honor, an ALA 2009 Children's Notable Book listing, and an ALA 2009 Sibert Honor. His second book, Mermaid Queen, by Shana Corey, was published in early 2009. It has received starred reviews from the School Library Journal and Kirkus Reviews.