You Could Make This Place Beautiful: A Memoir

Maggie Smith (1977) is an American poet and writer from Columbus, Ohio. As a child, Smith was fearful and suspicious of surprises. Her family nicknamed her Check Listy for her devotion to planning and organizing. Smith describes her family as close, and she takes pride in living near her loved ones and spending time with them. Smith graduated with a BA from Ohio Wesleyan University and an MFA from Ohio State University. Smith’s experiences after university are detailed in the memoir You Could Make This Place Beautiful, a New York Times bestseller, which explores the end of her marriage, her overnight fame, and the reconstruction of her personal identity. Smith met her husband while taking a creative writing workshop in college. After graduating, she worked as an editor for a children’s book publisher while her husband finished law school. The couple had two children, Violet and Rhett. The birth of her children and her two miscarriages impacted Smith’s mental health.

In 2011, Smith received a Creative Writing Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts. The writer left her work as an editor and devoted herself fully to freelance writing. After the 2016 election and Trump’s inauguration, Smith grappled with what it meant to raise her children in a new world.