CATHERINE RYAN HYDE is a critically acclaimed novelist and award-winning short story writer. She is the author of more than forty published stories, the story collection Earthquake Weather and the novels Funerals for Horses, Pay it Forward, Electric God, and the new Walter's Purple Heart. The national bestseller Pay It Forward was adapted into a major Warner Brothers feature film starring Kevin Spacey, Helen Hunt, and Haley Joel Osment ("The Sixth Sense"). Electric God and Walter's Purple Heart are also optioned for film and in development.