DeBartolo is the daughter of former
San Francisco 49ers owner
Edward J. DeBartolo, Jr. She attended the all-girls Villa Maria High School and dropped out her senior year when she was not allowed to graduate early. DeBartolo later obtained her
GED and graduated from
UC Berkeley with a philosophy degree, then moved to Los Angeles. She has previously lived in New York City and
Boulder, Colorado, and now resides in the
San Francisco Bay Area. DeBartolo's novel writing career began after her screenwriting/directorial debut, with
God-Shaped Hole (2002) and
How to Kill a Rock Star (2005), both from
Sourcebooks Landmark.
Sidney Sheldon has praised DeBartolo's sophomore novel, saying it has "Wonderful characters wrapped up in a story that moves like an express train".
God-Shaped Hole was published in the UK as
The Shape of My Heart. In 2020, DeBartolo released
Sorrow published by Woodhall Press.
Sorrow was inspired by the song of the same name by
The National from their 2010 album
High Violet. She also wrote the text for
Grace: Based on the Jeff Buckley Story, a
graphic novel about American musician
Jeff Buckley (2019). ==Bright Antenna==