Beth Winegarner is a journalist, author, essayist and pop culture critic who’s contributed to the New Yorker, The Guardian, The Washington Post, Wired, Mother Jones, and many others. She is a former daily news reporter for the San Francisco Examiner and a former contributor to The San Francisco Chronicle. She is the author of several books, including Sacred Sonoma, Beloved, The Columbine Effect: How Five Teen Pastimes Got Caught in the Crossfire and Why Teens are Taking Them Back, and Tenacity: Heavy Metal in the Middle East and Africa. She is a member of the Writers Grotto, based in San Francisco.