Mark Stein

Mark Stein is the author of How the States Got Their Shapes, a New York Times Best Seller that became the basis of the History Channel series of the same name, and its companion book, How the States Got Their Shapes Too: The People Behind the Borderlines. His other non-fiction books include American Panic: A History of Who Scares Us and Why; Vice Capades: Sex, Drugs and Bowling from the Pilgrims to the Present, and The Presidential Fringe: Jesting & Questing for the Oval Office. Stein wrote the screenplay for Housesitter, starring Steve Martin and Goldie Hawn; plays produced off-Broadway at Manhattan Theatre Club and numerous regional theatres. He is also the author of My Baboons Padding Around, a collection of his poetry. Stein lives in Washington, D.C., where he has taught at Catholic University and American University.