Annie Groovie

• Name — Annie Groovie • Born — 11 April 1970 • Birthplace — Trois-Rivières, Quebec, Canada • Occupation — writer, illustrator, cartoonist • Genre — children's literature, comics • Website — http: www.anniegroovie.com/

At three years of age, her family moved to Sainte-Foy (at the time a suburb of Quebec City). Groovie later earned a degree in Plastic Arts and a Bachelor's Degree in Graphic Communications at Université Laval, before pursuing a career as a commercial designer for Cossette, Inc. for several years in Montreal, where she has lived since 1994. Adept at gymnastics and circus performance, Groovie was selected in 1997 by the World Circus to spend three months in Chile to teach circus skills to street children; she would later go to Africa on a similar mission in 2000. Her travels took her to several countries around the world, including France, Switzerland, Chile, Brazil, Argentina, Costa Rica, Panama, Mexico, Cuba, Senegal and the United States. In 2003, Groovie created Léon, a male cyclops with a shaggy hairdo; she would soon began to write a series of books for children's publisher La Courte échelle surrounding him and his cycloptic friends—Lola, his girlfriend; and Le Chat, the cat. The format of these books were part-comic book, part children's book, in which the adventures of Léon are drawn out in a series of adventures, jokes, riddles, games and fake advertisement parodies. In 2006, she left her advertising career to work full-time on Léon. Beginning the fall of 2007, Radio-Canada television and CBC Television debuted a series of sixty-second shorts featuring Léon and friends, which aired generally between programs during their children's blocks. A weekly Léon strip was also published Saturdays in Le Petit Journal, a weekly children's supplement included with Le Journal de Montréal and associated newspapers; this feature would be cancelled by the paper after the July 13, 2013 edition. Léon's books have since been translated to Arabic, Korean, Italian, Spanish and Chinese. Groovie has been a four-time winner of the Hackmatack Awards, which is awarded to the favourite Canadian children's books as nominated by readers in Atlantic Canada. She was also the Guest of Honor at the 2010 Salon international du livre de Québec in Quebec City. On October 10, 2014, Groovie's publisher, La courte échelle, declared bankruptcy. On January 31, 2015, Groovie announced that her Léon-related works would be self-published under her own imprint, Groovie éditions, shortly after legally repossessing the rights and stock of her books and creations from La courte échelle. Her Missions à réaliser line of books, which were introduced shortly before La courte échelle's bankruptcy, would be transferred to another publisher, Éditions les Malins.