Bettina Brown was born in country New South Wales, Australia, and has lived in Newcastle with her husband since 2010.
She retired in 2020 and volunteers for Meals on Wheels. She enjoys yoga, lawn bowls and spending time with family.
Bettina is a first-time author and never expected her story to be published - it was just a story for her grandchildren to enjoy. Her two oldest grandsons (then 8 and 6) read it and loved it, so she thought it must be okay!
The inspiration for the story came from a painting of a multi-coloured zebra by her daughter-in-law. The idea came to write about finding one's true self and the struggle to be accepted when we are born a little bit different. Rainbow tries hard to be just like the other zebras but comes to realise that being different is not a bad thing and then the others see that Rainbow is just like them anyway.
Bettina enjoys writing and hopes to find the inspiration to write another children's story in the future.