28 Facts About Cheryl Strayed

1.

Cheryl Strayed is an American writer and podcast host.

2.

Cheryl Strayed has written four books: the novel Torch and the nonfiction books Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail, Tiny Beautiful Things and Brave Enough.

3.

Wild, which told the story of a long hike that Strayed took in 1995, was an international bestseller, and was adapted as the 2014 Academy Award-nominated film Wild.

4.

Cheryl Strayed was born in Spangler, Pennsylvania, the second daughter of Barbara Anne "Bobbi" and Ronald Nyland.

5.

Cheryl Strayed's parents divorced soon after and Cheryl's father left her life.

6.

When Cheryl Strayed was 12 her mother married Glenn Lambrecht, and the following year the family moved to rural Aitkin County, where they lived in a house that they had built themselves on 40 acres.

7.

Indoor plumbing was installed after Cheryl Strayed moved away for college.

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8.

Cheryl Strayed has two half-siblings from her father's second marriage, with whom she connected only after 'Wild' was published.

9.

In 1986, at the age of 17, Cheryl Strayed graduated from McGregor High School in McGregor, Minnesota.

10.

In 1987, during the summer, Cheryl Strayed worked as a newspaper reporter for her hometown county weekly, the Aitkin Independent Age in Aitkin, Minnesota.

11.

Cheryl Strayed loosely based the fictional Coltrap County in her novel Torch on McGregor and Aitkin County.

12.

Cheryl Strayed attended her freshman year of college at the University of St Thomas in Saint Paul, but by her sophomore year, she transferred to the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis, where she received her Bachelor of Arts degree, with a double major in English and Women's Studies.

13.

In March 1991, when Cheryl Strayed was a senior in college, her mother, Bobbi Lambrecht, died suddenly of lung cancer at the age of 45.

14.

Cheryl Strayed has written about her experiences dabbling in heroin use in her twenties.

15.

Cheryl Strayed has worked as a waitress, youth advocate, political organizer, temporary office employee, and emergency medical technician throughout her 20s and early 30s, while writing and often traveling around the United States.

16.

Cheryl Strayed writes the popular Dear Sugar advice column, which is published on her Substack newsletter.

17.

Cheryl Strayed first began writing the column on the website The Rumpus starting in March 2010, when the column's originator Steve Almond asked her to take over for him.

18.

Cheryl Strayed wrote the column anonymously until February 14,2012, when she revealed her identity as "Sugar" at a "Coming Out Party" hosted by the Rumpus at the Verdi Club in San Francisco.

19.

Cheryl Strayed's work has been selected three times for inclusion in The Best American Essays.

20.

Cheryl Strayed was the guest editor of The Best American Essays 2013 and The Best American Travel Writing 2018.

21.

Cheryl Strayed won a Pushcart Prize for her essay "Munro Country," which was originally published in The Missouri Review.

22.

The essay is about a letter Cheryl Strayed received from Alice Munro when she was a young writer, and Munro's influence on Cheryl Strayed's writing.

23.

Cheryl Strayed was a writer and executive producer on the show.

24.

Cheryl Strayed is a public speaker and often gives lectures about her life and books.

25.

Cheryl Strayed has hosted two hit podcasts for The New York Times.

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26.

Cheryl Strayed married Marco Littig in August 1988, a month before her 20th birthday.

27.

Cheryl Strayed chose Strayed for its symbolism and because she liked how it sounded together with her first name.

28.

Cheryl Strayed served on the first board of directors for Vida: Women in Literary Arts and has been active in many feminist and progressive causes.