PATTI MCCRACKEN is an award-winning journalist whose articles have appeared in Smithsonian, The Wall Street Journal, Columbia Journalism Review, and elsewhere. She has worked in various newsrooms, including the Chicago Tribune, and was twice a Knight International Press Fellow. She was based abroad for nearly two decades, and worked extensively as a journalism trainer in the former Soviet bloc, the Balkans, North Africa, and Southeast Asia. She now resides on Martha’s Vineyard, where she is at work on a screenplay with legendary screenwriter Ron Bass. The Angel Makers: Arsenic, a Midwife, and Modern History’s Most Astonishing Murder Ring (William Morrow), is her first book.