Susan Madden Lankford earned a B.S. in medical technology from the University of Nebraska, did graduate work in photography, and attended workshops with photographic masters such as Ansel Adams, Richard Misrach, and Ruth Bernhard. After years as a successful professional photographer, Lankford became deeply aware of America's disenfranchised and began focusing her energy and her cameras on their lives and challenges. Maggots in My Sweet Potatoes: Women Doing Time was the first in her trilogy of award-winning books, followed by downTown U.S.A.: A Personal Journey with the Homeless and Born, Not Raised. Lankford also executive-produced the film It's More Expensive to Do Nothing, a penetrating look at a central crisis in the American criminal justice system, stressing the social and economic value of remediation.