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Jo grew up in the middle of the Mississippi piney woods just outside a ghost town in a county where storytelling was a major form of entertainment. This tradition inspired her passion for writing. She spent her childhood roaming the woods, inventing characters, and picking way more than her share of butterbeans.

Jo holds a BA from Millsaps College and a J.D. from Yale Law School, where she received the Israel H. Perez prize for the best student contribution to the Yale Law Journal and served as a Notes Topics Editor for the Yale Law Journal. Jo is an award-winning attorney, a Liberty Fellow, a dedicated writer and an enthusiastic supporter of children’s writers and illustrators.

She currently serves as President of The Emrys Foundation and is past ARA for SCBWI-Carolinas. She is a founding member of the Upstate Children’s Writer’s Group and a regular columnist on writing topics for the Pen & Palette, published by SCBWI-Carolinas. She lives with her chef husband and three children in Greenville, South Carolina, where she practices corporate and securities law, raises fruits, vegetables, flowers and many, many weeds, and writes every day.

Jo grew up in the middle of the Mississippi piney woods just outside a ghost town in a county where storytelling was a major form of entertainment. This tradition inspired her passion for writing. She spent her childhood roaming the woods, inventing characters, and picking way more than her share of butterbeans. Jo holds a BA from Millsaps College and a J.D. from Yale Law School, where she re... More