I’m a lifelong scribbler cum author and second-generation writer with a DNA-deep passion for storytelling. Restless by nature, I left a small town in the Midwest to try my luck as a crime reporter in New York City where I covered breaking news for major media, including the New York Daily News, The New York Times and New York Post. I earned a master’s degree from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism and was awarded the school’s top prize, a Pulitzer Traveling Fellowship. I followed that up with a Ph.D. in literature and writing practices from Albany University and sat still long enough to write three nonfiction books about  historic air disasters for Smithsonian Books and Penguin Random House. I now live in the Mojave desert where I spend most days and the occasional insomnia fueled night deep diving into memoirs by other women writers.