Anita Swanson SpeakeAnita Swanson Speake was born and raised in Minnesota. She completed her nurse's training and began her nursing career in Minneapolis before moving to Los Angeles. She spent thirty one years working as a registered nurse in emergency rooms and intensve care units. As she finished her career in nursing she was looking for something a little lower in stress and found exactly what she was looking for at the UCLA Writer's Program and the Iowa Writer's Summer Workshop. Her first book, Slow Hope: The Long Journey Home, was awarded four-and-a-half stars by Writer's Digest. It also captured first place in Taproot Literary Review. Speake currently lives with her husband in Southern California, where she writes and tries to stay fit enough to keep up with her eight grandsons. Read More Read Less