Laura Caldwell

Laura Caldwell is a Chicago law professor, a former civil trial attorney, the founding director of Life After Innocence, and author of 14 novels and 2 nonfiction books. Laura's first novel, Burning the Map, was voted as one of the best books of the year by Barnes and Noble.com. After the release of The Year of Living Famously and The Night I Got Lucky. Booklist declared "Caldwell is one of the most talented and inventive ... writers around." The release of her Izzy McNeil trilogy (Red Hot Lies, Red Blooded Murder and Red White & Dead) received critical acclaim and nominations for industry awards. While researching her sixth novel, The Rome Affair, Caldwell was led to the criminal case that formed the basis for her first nonfiction book, Long Way Home: A Young Man Lost in the System and the Two Women Who Found Him (Simon & Schuster). A 19-year-old who swore he was innocent of murder charges, languished in a Chicago holding cell for nearly six years without so much as a trial date until Laura joined a renowned criminal defense attorney to defend him, a trial she details in Long Way Home. Laura founded and ran Loyola Chicago Law School's Life After Innocence program from 2009 - 2017, which assisted wrongfully convicted individuals to re-enter society and reclaim their lives. To support after innocence efforts, she gathered famed authors and exonerees to write about the experience of being wrongfully convicted and exonerated in Anatomy of Innocence: Testimonies of the Wrongfully Convicted. Laura is published in over 25 countries and translated into more than 13 languages. Laura is also a freelance magazine writer and has been published in Chicago Magazine, Woman's Own, The Young Lawyer, Lake Magazine, Australia Woman's Weekly, Shore Magazine and others.