Salima Alikhan's mother often read to her daughter the dark imaginative tales
of Hans Christian Anderson and the Brothers Grimm, as well as allegories from
the Koran and the tales in The Arabian Nights. These stories helped her
imagination develop to include all things enchanted and grotesque.
After high school, Alikhan moved to France for a winter and traveled
throughout Germany. When she came back to the United States she enrolled in
college with the intention of becoming a child psychologist. However, she soon
realized her passion was in writing and illustration and left college to pursue
a full-time career in graphic arts. Three years later, she provided artwork for
her first picture book, Pieces of Another World, which won Kahani
magazine's 2006 Distinguished Achievement Award from the Association of
Educational Publishers. She collaborated with the Fernbank Science Center
in Atlanta, Georgia, to turn her award-winning artwork into a planetarium show.
Alikhan has worked as an English tutor in Rennes, France, at a shelter in
Virginia for abused and neglected animals, and as a teacher. She has taught art
at Georgetown Montessori School in Washington, D.C., Harmonia School of Music
and Art in Alexandria, Virginia, and Reston Montessori School in Reston,
Virginia. She loves to encourage her students' interest in the arts.
Alikhan is a member of the Society of Children's Book Writers and
Illustrators and has created covers and interior illustrations for Kahani
magazine and Confetti magazine. When not drawing, she enjoys biking,
hiking, and traveling. Alikhan works as an illustrator in Austin, Texas.