Born in Southern California in 1927, Betty Fussell grew up in Riverside but lived most of her life in the New York area. She is the author of 12 books including The Story of Corn and My Kitchen Wars. Her essays on food, travel, and the arts have appeared in national publications and scholarly journals. She has taught the history of food and its importance to American culture at colleges and universities across the country and has lectured to audiences everywhere from New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art to Iowa's State Fair. In 2012, she moved back to California to live at Casa Dorinda in Montecito. Her latest book How To Cook a Coyote: The Joy of Old Age was recently named Editor’s Choice by The New York Times.