Vanessa Christman grew up as an Ag kid in California's Central Valley before earning a degree in Anthropology from UC San Diego and a Master of Science in Library and Information Science from Drexel University. She has worked in public and law libraries throughout the state and is currently Principal Librarian and Section Head at the California State Library, managing the State Law Library and Government Publications collections. She is also a researcher and writer with the Maya Exploration Center, and is completing an MA in Archaeology and Heritage at the University of Leicester. Her dissertation develops a framework drawn from the cognitive science of awe and applies it to archaeological knowledge formation.