Dr. Lora-Ellen McKinney is a child psychologist and health policy analyst turned writer. Becoming a psychologist combined her creative passions and parental expectations for service to others. Healing children fulfilled her community and spiritual commitments. Dr. McKinney received an A.B. from Vassar College, M.S. and Ph.D. degrees from Seattle’s University of Washington, and a Master's degree in Public Administration from the Harvard University School of Government. Lora-Ellen was recognized for the Kellogg Fellowship when she began the Clearinghouse for Drug Exposed Children at UCSF Medical School; this program was later used by federal health and education departments. She later became a Salzburg Seminar Fellows selected to design conflict resolution strategies for the Balkans, Israel and Palestine. Lora-Ellen worked in health policy for hospitals and think tanks in the nation’s capital. Again a writer, her books about African American faith and practice have won awards. McKinney now applies clinical, policy, faith and political experience into fiction about children who learn to heal themselves. Lora-Ellen lives on the Cedar River south of Seattle on which she daily walks with her dog, Scout