Joshua Pruett is a Primetime Emmy and Annie Award–nominated TV writer, author, and storyboard artist best known for his work on Mystery Science Theater 3000, Phineas and Ferb, and Disney XD’s Milo Murphy’s Law. His debut middle-grade book series Shipwreckers will launch in 2019. He is the author of The Jungle Book: The Strength of the Wolf Is the Pack, an adaptation of the 2016 live-action feature film.

James began his career as a paper engineer with Elgin Davis Studios. Learning from the ground-up, he has developed into one of America’s most accomplished Paper Engineers. From 1980 to 1989 James served as the Creative Director for Intervisual developing over 200 children’s pop-up and novelty books. In 1989 he founded White Heat, Ltd. which published and packaged over 300 hundred children’s novelty books, for such publishing giants as National Geographic, Random House, Simon and Schuster, Scholastic, Little Brown and Dutton Books to name a few. In 1999, James R. Diaz, along with David Carter authored and created “Elements of Pop Up: A Pop Up Book for Aspiring Paper Engineers,” which many art schools across America continue to use to this day as their primary textbook for teaching this highly skilled art form.