About the Author

LESLIE BUDEWITZ IS PASSIONATE ABOUT FOOD, GREAT mysteries, and the Northwest, the setting for her national-best-selling Spice Shop Mysteries and Food Lovers’ Village Mysteries. Leslie is a three-time Agatha Award winner—2011 Best Nonfiction for Books, Crooks & Counselors: How to Write Accurately About Criminal Law and Courtroom Procedure (Linden/Quill Driver Books); 2013 Best First Novel for Death al Dente (Berkley Prime Crime), first in the Food Lovers’ Village Mysteries; and 2018 Best Short Story for “All God’s Sparrows” (Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine). Her books and stories have also won or been nominated for Derringer, Anthony, and Macavity awards. A practicing lawyer, she served as president of Sisters in Crime in 2015–16 and currently serves on the board of Mystery Writers of America.

Leslie loves to cook, eat, hike, travel, garden, and paint—not necessarily in that order. She lives in Northwest Montana with her husband, Don Beans, a musician and doctor of natural medicine, and their cat, an avid bird-watcher.

Visit her online at www.LeslieBudewitz.com, where you’ll find maps, recipes, discussion questions, links to her short stories, and more.