Mary Roach is the author of BONK, Spook, and the New York Times bestseller Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers. Stiff was a Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers pick for 2003, a Northern California Book Awards finalist, and an American Library Association Alex Award (for adult books that appeal to young adults) winner. Stiff has been translated into 16 languages, including Hungarian (Hullamerev) and Lithuania(Negyveilai). Before writing Bonk, Spook and Stiff, Mary wrote columns, essays, and feature articles for Outside, Wired, GQ, Salon.com, and the New York Times Magazine, among many others. She has always gravitated toward the peculiar, covering things like Eskimo food, flatulence, killer bees, vaginal weight-lifting, carrot addiction, and amputee bowling leagues. Mary works in an office with five other writers in Oakland, California, down the hall from a cosmetology school which produces a lot of fumes and perhaps explains Mary's writing style.