Nancy Hayfield is an author, editor, and publisher. In 1979, she graduated

summa cum laude Latin honors are a system of Latin phrases used in some colleges and universities to indicate the level of distinction with which an academic degree has been earned. The system is primarily used in the United States. It is also used in some Sout ...

from

Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private Ivy League research university in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial ...

. Nancy Hayfield's first novel '' Cleaning House'' was published by

Farrar, Straus and Giroux Farrar, Straus and Giroux (FSG) is an American book publishing company, founded in 1946 by Roger Williams Straus Jr. and John C. Farrar. FSG is known for publishing literary books, and its authors have won numerous awards, including Pulitzer P ...

in 1980. In 1985, writing under her married name of Nancy Birnes, Hayfield published ''Cheaper and Better'' at Harper & Row (now

HarperCollins HarperCollins Publishers LLC is a British–American publishing company that is considered to be one of the "Big Five (publishers), Big Five" English-language publishers, along with Penguin Random House, Hachette Book Group USA, Hachette, Macmi ...

) and was the host of a

PBS The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcaster and non-commercial, free-to-air television network based in Arlington, Virginia. PBS is a publicly funded nonprofit organization and the most prominent provider of educat ...

show called ''Living Cheaper and Better''. In 1990, she published ''Zap Crafts'' at

Ten Speed Press Ten Speed Press is a publishing house founded in Berkeley, California, in 1971 by Phil Wood. It was bought by Random House in February 2009 and became part of their Crown Publishing Group division. History Wood worked with Barnes & Noble in 196 ...

, described in the Chicago Tribune as a "book of recreational fun"--"one of those oddities that is fun to thumb through." She was the editor of the McGraw-Hill Personal Computer Programming Encyclopedia in 1986 and 1989, the UFO Magazine UFO Encyclopedia in 2002. She was also the last editor-in-chief of

UFO Magazine ''UFO Magazine'' was an American magazine that was devoted to the subject of unidentified flying objects (UFOs), the extraterrestrial hypothesis (ETH), as well as paranormal and Charles Fort, Fortean subjects in general. History and profile ...

when that publication ceased publication. She is currently the editor-in-chief of

Filament Books The word filament, which is descended from Latin ''filum'' meaning " thread", is used in English for a variety of thread-like structures, including: Astronomy * Galaxy filament, the largest known cosmic structures in the universe * Solar filament ...

''Cleaning House''

Her first novel ''Cleaning House'' (1980) was widely reviewed. One of the two reviews in the ''

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...

'' called it "wildly funny."ARISTOCRAT & HOUSEWIFE: eview New York Times, Late Edition (East Coast); New York, N.Y. ew York, N.Yec 28, 1980: A.9.

References

20th-century American novelists American women novelists Princeton University alumni Year of birth missing (living people) Living people American editors American publishers (people) 20th-century American women writers 21st-century American women {{US-editor-stub