Background

Ruth Pennebaker has written adult fiction (Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakthrough, 2011), as well as three highly acclaimed young-adult novels, Don't Think Twice, Conditions of Love, and Both Sides Now. Her essays and articles have appeared in The New York Times, Washington Post, Texas Monthly, The Dallas Morning News, Parents, Redbook, McCall's, Cooking Light, and other nationwide publications.

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Her most recent work is a collaboration with artist/cartoonist Marian Henley on Pucker Up! The Subversive Woman’s Guide to Aging with Wit, Wine, Drama, Humor, Perspective, and the Occasional Good Cry, a wise and cheeky guide to living as well as possible as you age. Pucker Up!, which is lavishly and wickedly illustrated, is the kind of book you’d buy for yourself or give your best friend when she turns 50 or 60 or 70. Pennebaker and Henley are now collaborating on an aging project on Instagram: Bluehourdames.

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Ruth and her mad-scientist husband, both of whom seem to be aging somewhat, live in downtown Austin, hoping this will make them look cool. They are parents of an adult daughter and son and have four grandchildren. So far, anyway.

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Ms. Pennebaker's hobbies are reading, yoga, social criticism, and free-form worrying. A card-carrying member of the Chickasaw Nation, she was born in Ponca City, Oklahoma, close to a refinery. She holds a bachelor's degree in comparative literature from Eckerd College and, for reasons that now elude her, a J.D. with honors from the University of Texas School of Law.