Author and artist Tammy Yee grew up in Honolulu, Hawaii, where she explored tide pools, swam in streams, and wrote and illustrated spooky stories her teachers politely read. After she graduated from college she worked as a pediatric registered nurse. Having children rekindled her love for picture books, so in 1994 she exchanged her stethoscope for a paintbrush and she's been writing and illustrating ever since.
Tammy has worked on more than 24 books including The Tsunami Quilt (written by Anthony Fredericks, Sleeping Bear Press), Honor Awards winner for the 2008 Storytelling World Awards in the Stories for Pre-Adolescent Listeners category and one of The Bank Street College of Education's "Best Books of the Year" for 2007; A is for Aloha (written by Uilani Goldsberry, Sleeping Bear Press), selected by the Hawaii Center for the Book to represent the state at the 2006 National Book Festival; Lullaby Moon (written by Elaine Masters), winner of the 2003 Ka Palapala Po'okela Award for Excellence in Children's Books; and Baby Honu's Incredible Journey, an island children's classic.
In addition, Tammy has given numerous presentations in schools and libraries across Hawaii. She has presented at the 2000 Hawaii Island Writers Conference, the 2005 Read To Me Conference in Honolulu, the 2005 and 2006 SCBWI-Hawaii Annual Conferences and the 2007 Honolulu Writer's Conference. Her paintings are on display at the Mazza Museum in Findlay, Ohio.