Hendrik Groen started his diaries on the literary website of Torpedo magazine. His first diary The Secret Diary of Hendrik Groen, 83 1/4 Years Old has been translated into over thirty languages and On The Bright Side went straight to number 1 in its native Netherlands. Hester Velmans is the author of two popular children's novels ... Read moreand a translator specializing in modern fiction. Her translation of Renate Dorrestein's A Heart of Stone won the Vondel Prize for Translation and was a Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers selection. Her translation of Lulu Wang's The Lily Theater was a New York Times Notable Book of the Year. Her children's book Isabel of the Whales now has a sibling: the second in the Whales Series, Jessaloup's Song (age 10 and up). Hester Velmans is a translator specializing in contemporary Dutch and French literature. Her translation of Renate Dorrestein's A Heart of Stone won the Authors' Society's Vondel Prize, and in 2014 she was awarded an NEA Translation Fellowship to translate the neglected novelist Herman Franke. She is also the author of the popular children's books Isabel of the Whales and Jessaloup's Song, and the historical novel Slipper. Show Less