The author, Ilse Herlinger, is also known as Ilse Weber (1903-1944). Not much is known about this talented author of children's stories. She was born in 1903 and she wrote three books between the years 1927-1929. She married in 1930 to Willi Weber, she had two sons, one born in 1931, the other in 1934. The older son, Hanus, was sent to live in Sweden with friends in 1939; the rest of the family, unfortunately, was not as lucky. Weber, her husband and youngest son did not make it out of Czechoslovakia and were sent to Theresienstadt in 1942.

All three were shipped to Auschwitz in 1944. The mother and the younger brother were gassed. The father was put in a slave labor camp and he survived barely. He was deathly sick but did survive and came back to Prague. He was reunited with Hanus and lived another 30 years.

While at Theresienstadt she is reported to have recited her poetry at night to entertain other people and to play a guitar. While thousands died at Theresienstadt from starvation and disease, and thousands more were deported and killed at extermination camps, amid it all, Weber found the strength to create and to care for others - a memorial at the camp today details her work there as its head children's nurse.