ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Susan Bell is the author of The Artful Edit: On the Practice of Editing Yourself (W.W. Norton & Co., August, 2007), and co-author with Jason West of Dare to Hope: Saving American Democracy, a collection of essays on political activism (Miramax, 2005). A former editor at Random House and Conjunctions magazine, she has edited both fiction and nonfiction professionally for twenty years. As an editor and writer, she also collaborates with her husband, Mitch Epstein, a visual artist, on books and exhibitions. In 2001, she created a seminar on self-editing for the New School's graduate writing program, and continues to teach there.

Susan has lived in New York City since 1984, when she attended graduate school at Columbia University and earned a Master's degree in French Literature. Born in Massachusetts, she has also lived in Delaware, California and France.