Craig Pittman, author of the twisted and amazing new non-fiction book "Oh, Florida! How America's Weirdest State Influences the Rest of the Country," is a native Floridian. Born in Pensacola, he graduated from Troy State University in Alabama, where his muckraking work for the student paper prompted an agitated dean to label him "the most destructive force on campus." Since then he has covered a variety of newspaper beats and quite a few natural disasters, including hurricanes, wildfires and the Florida Legislature. Since 1998 he has reported on environmental issues for Florida's largest newspaper, the Tampa Bay Times (formerly the St. Petersburg Times), where his coverage has won both state and national awards. A series he co-wrote with Matthew Waite became their book, "Paving Paradise: Florida's Vanishing Wetlands and the Failure of No Net Loss" (2009). Since then Pittman has written "Manatee Insanity: Inside the War Over Florida's Most Famous Endangered Species" (2010), which the Florida Humanities Council declared an "essential read" for all Floridians, and "The Scent of Scandal: Greed, Betrayal, and the World's Most Beautiful Orchids," which the Atlanta Journal-Constitution declared "irresistible." He lives in St. Petersburg, Fla., with his wife and two children. For more, see http://www.oh-florida.com/home.html