Borrowing techniques from sociologists and investigative reporters, I use a history-from-the-ground-up approach. My role models are Studs Terkel and the late Mike Wallace, who headed the Gotham Center for New York City, where I was listed as an “expert resource” from 2003–2015.

For most of my life, my day job was journalism. I worked on daily papers in Virginia and Pennsylvania before moving to New York, where I was a two-time columnist for ELLE, a senior editor at Glamour, and a department head at InStyle and Mirabella magazines. Transitioning to business beats, I became an editor and columnist at Fairchild Publications (WWD/DNR/Menswear) covering post-WTO trade, fibers, textiles, trend forecasting, and international luxury retail. Along the way, I freelanced for publications including Fast Company, Salon, Health, The Hollywood Reporter, Travel & Leisure, and The New York Times Magazine. 

My new book, which grew out of my year-long fellowship at the Leon Levy Center for Biography, was called “one of the most anticipated books of 2026” (Lit Hub). In advance of publication, Selling Opportunity: The Story of Mary Kay received praise from respected historians, blurbs from  award-winning authors, and a starred review from Publishers Weekly.

After its April 28 publication, Selling Opportunity was named an Editors’ Choice in The New York Times Book Review, and was reviewed in The Wall Street Journal, Kirkus, Texas Monthly, The Dallas Morning News, Harper’s, People, The New York Post, The Washington Independent Review of Books, and LIBER: A Feminist Review, as well as regional publications ranging from The Winnipeg Free Press to the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. Kirkus put it on the list of “Nonfiction Books That Read Like Novels.” Excerpts ran in Town & Country, Lit Hub, and D Magazine.

I currently live in Boston, where I am working on my next book.