Working on Green with Envy was a dream. As a journalist, I’ve always been paid to ask people questions. This time, I had the job of really prying. What fun – and all for a very good cause. Green with Envy gripped me like no other project ever has. (And that’s how a book should be.) I could have easily doubled the number of chapters and the length of each one. As I worked on it, I became obsessed. Each chapter grew into my favorite. My husband, the only person besides the sources whom I had time to talk to, asked if there was anything we could talk about other than The Book. (There actually wasn’t.) The official stuff: I grew up in Flint, Michigan, a gritty but wonderful place to grow up. I studied economics and political science undergrad at Columbia University, and went back there for master’s degrees in journalism and in international affairs. In between, I’ve lived and worked in Saint Petersburg, Russia (where I edited the cultural section of the main English-language newspaper), in Paris (the only time in my life I’ve tried writing fiction – I’d rather wrap a boa constrictor around my neck now than have to make up a story), and in the Middle East (where I got to live the low-paid but high-adventure life of a foreign correspondent). As an independent journalist over the past 12 years, I’ve contributed regularly to The New York Times, The Christian Science Monitor, Crain’s New York Business, Forbes.com, Good Housekeeping and “Marketplace” on national public radio. Samples of my work are available here. What else… well, there’s always more. That’s certainly one thing you’ll learn by reading Green with Envy