Betsy Sholl grew up in Brick Town, New Jersey. She earned degrees from Bucknell University, the University of Rochester, and Vermont College. Her previous books are Changing Faces, Appalachian Winter, and Rooms Overhead. She was the 1991 winner of the Maine Arts Commission chapbook competition, and a recipient of an Individual Artists Fellowship from the Maine Arts Commission. She lives with her family in Portland, Maine and teaches at the University of South Maine.

The Red Line would be worth reading for this honesty, an intensity and clarity of vision that can be the same as joy. . . . This is a greatly impressive collection, which recounts pain without pretending it can go away, without claiming there's nothing else.