Tim Sandlin is an American novelist and screenwriter. Born in Oklahoma, Sandlin spent his early summers in Wyoming while his father worked seasonally for Grand Teton National Park. Sandlin worked over 40 entry-level jobs including driving an ice cream truck, skinning elk, cooking in a Chinese restaurant, trail inventory for the Forest Service, caretaker of rental cabins, gardener for the Rockefellers, pizza parlor manager, belt buckle buffer, and multiple dishwashing jobs. Throughout this period he lived most of the year on public lands, first in a tent and later in a Cheyenne tipi. He has published eight novels and a book of columns. He written eleven screenplays for hire, two of which have been made into movies: Floating Away (1998), which was based on his novel Sorrow Floats and Skipped Parts (2001), based upon the novel of the same name.