DyAnne DiSalvo

DiSalvo was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York. She attended Fontbonne Hall Academy for Girls in Brooklyn and studied art at the School of Visual Arts in New York City. Before illustrating children's books, she worked as an artist for Hallmark Cards. In 1982, she met Jane Feder, then-Senior Editor at Harper and Row (now HarperCollins). Feder later founded the Jane Feder Agency, which represents children's book illustrators, and she was the agency's first client. She has given presentations at schools, targeting K-8 students, on the writing process and the life of a working artist. In the fall of 2010, she presented at the United Nations International School of Hanoi in Vietnam.

• Mo to the Rescue (1988) • Mo and his Friends (Dial, 1989)

• Two Dog Biscuits (1986) • The Real Hole (1986) • The Growing-Up Feet (1987) • Janet's Thingamajigs (1987)

• Kate's Skates (1996) • Nina, Nina Ballerina (1996) • Nina, Nina Star Ballerina (1997) • Nina, Nina Copycat Ballerina (2000)

• That New Baby (1980) • The Bear Under the Bed (E. P. Dutton, 1980) • The First Day of School (1981) • Best Friends (1983) • The Half Birthday Party (1984) • Those Terrible Terwilliger Twins (Raintree Heinemann-Raintree, 1984) • Sam Ellis's Island (1985) • Saturday Belongs to Sara (Bradbury Press, 1988) • What did Mommy do Before You? (Albert Whitman &Co, 1988) • The Mommy Exchange (1988) • Why is Baby Crying? (Albert Whitman & Co, 1989) • The Best-Ever Good-Bye Party (1989) • George Washington's Mother (1992) • The Go-Between (1992) • The Christmas Knight (1993) • You Want Women to Vote, Lizzie Stanton? (1995) • Olivia and The Real Live Pet (1995) • Friends and Amigos Series (1995) • True Blue (1996) • The Bravest Cat, a True Story About Scarlet (1997) • Now We Can Have a Wedding (1998) • The American Wei (Albert Whitman & Co, 1998) • If I Were President (Albert Whitman & Co, 1999) • Is It Hanukkah Yet? (2000) • Our Eight Nights of Hanukkah (2000) • A Doll Named Dora Anne (2002) • Grandma's Smile (A Neal Porter Book/Roaring Brook Press/Macmillan, 2010)

DiSalvo wrote and illustrated Uncle Willie and The Soup Kitchen (1991), which was inspired by her volunteer work at Chips Soup Kitchen in Brooklyn. The book received the 1991 Children's Book of the Year award from the Child Study Association of America Book Committee. It was also named Notable 1991 Children's Book by the National Council for the Social Studies and Children's Book Council United. The book was featured on the television show Reading Rainbow in 1996 and adapted into a children's play at the Puttin' on The Ritz Theatre in Oaklyn, New Jersey in 2000.

City Green (1994) tells the story of a young girl who helps transform a vacant city lot into a garden. Illustrations from the book served as inspiration for a children's playground at the Dallas Arboretum and Botanical Garden during the Storybook competition in 2009. Stagebridge Theater Company in Berkeley, California produced a musical adaptation. A 25th anniversary edition was published by HarperCollins in 2019.

From 1999 to 2012, DiSalvo played rhythm guitar and sang harmonies for the power-pop rock and roll band Smash Palace. Signed by Zip Records in 1999, the band toured the US and the UK and was listed among BBC Liverpool's Best Top Ten Live Acts in 2006. DiSalvo lives in Princeton, New Jersey, and is the mother of two adult children: educator and entrepreneur John E. Zangari-Ryan and screenwriter Marja-Lewis Ryan.