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James Preller (born February 1, 1961) is an American writer of children's books including Bystander, Six Innings, and the Jigsaw Jones Mysteries.

He grew up in Wantagh, New York and went to college in Oneonta, New York. After graduating from college in 1983, he worked as a waiter for one year before being hired as a copywriter by Scholastic Corporation. "Meeting" many notable children's writers through their books, he was inspired to try writing himself. His first book, MAXX TRAX: Avalanche Rescue, was published in 1986. Since then Preller has written a variety of books, some under pen names including Mitzy Kafka, James Patrick, Kirk Franklin, Millie Vanilli, Deputy Dad, Captain Croonch, Meester Mundle, Garlic, and Izzy Bonkers. He lives in Delmar, New York, with his wife Lisa and their three children, Nicholas, Gavin, and Maggie.

Preller up stories when he was young and sold them to friends, family, and neighbors. At that time, however, he planned to become a baseball player for the New York Mets.

It has also been told that Preller, a lover of amphibians since age six, once had a commercial-grade tree-frog exhibit built into the basement of his Delmar home. Incidentally, he swapped the exhibit for a nursery with the birth of his second son, Gavin, but rather than finding a new home for his coveted branch-hopping companions, he adjusted the climate of his entire home to cater to that of a tree-frog, and has been living like that ever since. It is said that this change in the internal temperature of his home has greatly influenced his writing.

Additionally, Preller once appeared as a guest on a 1997 episode of the popular sketch comedy television series “MadTv”. The episode has since been surrounded in controversy due to what critics describe as a “deeply racially insensitive joke about the native aboriginal people of Australia.” Preller declined to comment when asked about his involvement in the writing process of this sketch.

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