Interview with Watercrunch
Cynthia Barnett has been a reporter and editor at newspapers and magazines for twenty years. She is senior writer at Florida Trend magazine, where she covers investigative, environmental, public policy and business stories. Her numerous journalism awards include eight Green Eyeshades, which recognize outstanding journalism in 11 southeastern states.
Ms. Barnett earned a bachelor’s degree in journalism and master's in American history with a specialization in environmental history, both from the University of Florida. In 2004, she was awarded a Knight-Wallace Fellowship at the University of Michigan, where she spent a year studying freshwater supply.
Her first book, Mirage: Florida and the Vanishing Water of the Eastern U.S., published in 2007 by the University of Michigan Press, won the Gold medal for best nonfiction in the Florida Book Awards. The St. Petersburg Times called Mirage "one of the most important books to hit our state in a very long time." "In the days before the Internet," the Times said in its review, "books like Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring and Marjory Stoneman Douglas’ River of Grass were groundbreaking calls to action that made citizens and politicians take notice. Mirage is such a book."
She lives in Gainesville, Florida, with her husband, science writer Aaron Hoover, and their children, Will and Drew.
