Cat Winters was born and raised in Southern California, near Disneyland, which may explain her love of haunted mansions, bygone eras, and fantasylands. She received degrees in drama and English from the University of California, Irvine, and formerly worked in publishing. Her critically acclaimed debut novel, In the Shadow of Blackbirds, was named a 2014 Morris Award Finalist, a School Library Journal Best Book of 2013, a 2014 Best Fiction for Young Adults pick, and a 2013 Bram Stoker Award Nominee. Her second novel, The Cure for Dreaming, has been nominated for YALSA’s 2015 Best Fiction for Young Adults and the American Library Association’s 2015 Amelia Bloomer Project. Cat lives in Portland, Oregon, with her husband and two kids.