Todd James Pierce lives in a town called Orcutt, California, which is in the northern portion of Santa Barbara County. He is the author of four books, most recently Newsworld, which won the Drue Heinz Literature Prize and was a finalist for the John Gardner Book Award and the Paterson Prize. His novel, The Australia Stories (also published as A Woman of Stone) is regularly taught in high school and college literature classes. His work has been published in over 80 magazines and literary journals, including The Georgia Review, The Gettysburg Review, Indiana Review, The Iowa Review, The Missouri Review, North American Review, Shenandoah, The Sun, and Willow Springs. Recently he has finished a book-length manuscript, called The Artificial Matterhorn, which tells the story of the men and women who built the first wave of American theme parks. He is presently at work on a novel set in 1950's Hollywood and Burbank.