Daughter of Ronald and Nancy Reagan
The first child of Ronald Reagan's marriage to Nancy, Patti Davis overcame a number of personal obstacles, including drug addiction, self-harm, and an eating disorder, and discovered her voice through her writing.
Her first semi-autobiographical fiction novel, however, upset many members of her family, and Davis became estranged from her parents until her father's Alzheimer's diagnosis, when they reconciled. Now 61, Davis has published more than half a dozen other works since the first, and has also appeared on TV and in movies.