Tracy Barrett is the author of numerous books and magazine articles for young readers.

She holds a Bachelor's Degree with honors in Classics-Archaeology from Brown University and an M.A. and Ph.D. in Medieval Italian Literature from the University of California, Berkeley. Her scholarly interests in the ancient and medieval worlds overlap in her fiction and nonfiction works.

A grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities to study medieval women writers led to the writing of her award-winning young-adult novel, Anna of Byzantium.

Since 1999 Tracy Barrett has been Regional Advisor for the Midsouth (Tennessee and Kentucky) with the Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators. She has taught courses on writing for children and on children's literature at various institutions and frequently makes presentations to groups of students, librarians, teachers, and others.

She teaches Italian, Women's Studies, and Humanities at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee.

Biography provided by the autohr, February 2004.<:i>