Kristen McDermott

Kristen McDermott is the co-author, with her husband, Prof. Ari Berk, of The Life and Times of William Shakespeare (Templar Books 2010), which won the (UK) School Library Association’s 2011 Children’s Choice Award for Best Informational Book. She is a Professor of English Literature at Central Michigan University, specializing in Shakespeare studies, and has also taught at UCLA and Spelman College. She ha also published an academic text, Masques of Difference: Four Court Masques by Ben Jonson, a Revels Student Edition (Manchester University Press, 2007), and has written a series of general-readership articles on drama, fantasy literature, and folk traditions for Realms of Fantasy Magazine. She received her Ph.D. in English from the University of California, Los Angeles, and a B.A. in English and Drama from Furman University in South Carolina, and lives in Michigan with her husband and son.