MARGALIT FOX, an award-winning journalist trained as a linguist, is a senior writer for the New York Times. She holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees in linguistics from Stony Brook University and a master’s degree in journalism from Columbia University. Her previous book, Talking Hands: What Sign Language Reveals About the Mind, which takes readers to an isolated Middle Eastern village whose residents use a sign language unlike any other in the world, has been called ‘fascinating’ by the Washington Post, ‘masterly and accessible’ by Nature, and ‘astonishing’ by the Associated Press. She lives in Manhattan with her husband, the writer and critic George Robinson.