Margaret Renkl is the author of The Comfort of Crows: A Backyard Year (due from Spiegel & Grau on Oct. 24, 2023), as well as Late Migrations: A Natural History of Love and Loss and Graceland, At Last: Notes On Hope and Heartache From the American South. She is a contributing opinion writer for The New York Times, where her essays appear each Monday. A graduate of Auburn University and the University of South Carolina, she lives in Nashville.