of Shira Judith Rozan (1950– ) to become an architect, and when she succeeded, she decided she’d prefer to be a writer—and has succeeded at that, too. A native New Yorker (she was born in the Bronx), Rozan set her mystery novels and short stories mainly in various parts of the city.
Although Rozan has written a couple of stand-alone novels—Absent Friends (2004) and In This Rain (2006), and cowritten (with Carlos Dews) two paranormal novels under the Sam Cabot pseudonym, Blood of the Lamb (2013) and Skin of the Wolf (2014)—it is her series about Lydia Chin and Bill Smith for which she is best known. Each takes turns being the central figure in alternate novels.
Chin and Smith are partners in a private detective agency, and although they are quite different from each other, they do not make an outlandish “odd couple” pairing. Rozan has knowingly described them as based on herself. “Lydia is me as I was when I was her age,” she has explained. “She’s optimistic and full of energy. She believes that the world can be saved….Bill, on the other hand, is me as I am now—on a bad day. He’s been through enough bad stuff in his life that he knows what can’t be done.”
Many of their cases take them to New York’s Chinatown, an area Lydia knows well, as she lives there with her mother. While she is a thoroughly modern young woman, she respects the traditions of her culture, which often conflict with her job and her life.
Most of the books in the series have been nominated for or have won most of the major mystery awards; notably, Winter and Night (2002) won the Edgar for best novel of the year.
“Double-Crossing Delancey” was originally published in The Private Eye Writers of America Presents: Mystery Street #2, edited by Robert J. Randisi (New York, Signet, 2001).