Hi there!  I’m the New York Times bestselling and award-winning author of Body Drama and Diet Drama.  I also serve as the national spokeswoman for U by Kotex, a hip brand that’s changing how women talk about our periods.

Two weeks after graduating from Harvard with an honors degree in Women’s Studies and for multiple random reasons, which I’m happy to dish about over coffee, I entered the competitive world of beauty pageants and won the title of Miss Virginia.  I went on to make the Top 10 and win the swimsuit competition at Miss America. As I (over) share in my books, the emotional and physical ups and downs of these experiences gave me the idea for a series of empowering body books for young women, so after hanging up my crown, I went to the bookstore and bought How to Get Your Book Published for Dummies, which led to my book series. The rest is history!

Among other honors, I have been named L’OREAL’s Beauty of Giving Young Woman of the Year, an NAACP Image Award nominee, and I once won $250,000 on Who Wants to be a Millionaire (check out the video in the left column). I have been called upon to speak about empowerment and body issues on E! True Hollywood Story, NPR, PBS, Inside Edition, CBS’s The Early Show, Eyewitness Kids News, Discovery Channel, The Boston Globe, The Washington Post, USA Today, The New York Times, Forbes magazine, Good Morning America, CosmoGIRL!, J-14, and more.

I live in Los Angeles with my hubby and college sweetheart, actor Rupak Ginn, and our baby boy August.  I’m currently finishing up a rom-com novel and developing a television series on motherhood–both based on my own ridiculous experiences.  All three of us are in the picture below, hee hee!