Joanne Leedom-Ackerman is an American novelist, short story writer and journalist whose fiction and literary non-fiction includes The Far Side of the Desert, Burning Distance, regional bestseller The Dark Path to the River,[1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9] the short story collection No Marble Angels,[10] and PEN Journeys: Memoir of Literature on the Line.

Leedom-Ackerman's fiction and literary nonfiction work includes The Far Side of the Desert, Burning Distance, PEN Journeys: Memoir of Literature on the Line, The Dark Path to the River, No Marble Angels, and stories and essays in Short Stories of the Civil Rights Movement, Remembering Arthur Miller, Electric Grace, Snakes: An Anthology of Serpent Tales, Beyond Literacy, The Memorial Collection for Dr. Liu Xiaobo, Women For All Seasons, Fiction and Poetry by Texas Women, The Bicentennial Collection of Texas Short Stories, and What You Can Do.

She is also the senior editor and contributor to The Journey of Liu Xiaobo: From Dark Horse to Nobel Laureate.

[17] She currently serves on the boards of the International Center for Journalists,[18] Refugees International,[19] American Writers Museum,[20] and Words Without Borders[21][22] and is a member of the advisory board of the Edward R. Murrow Center at The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy[23] and the ICRW Leadership Council.

She is a member of the Chairman's Advisory Council of the United States Institute of Peace,[32] and she was an advisor for the Emmy-nominated PBS documentary A Force More Powerful: A Century of Nonviolent Conflict, which aired in two parts in September 2000.