A word about the author…

Maria Lynn Barrs is one of thirteen children—the first girl, with three older brothers—a birth order she believes shaped her essence by the time she was eight.

A girl’s gotta be a bit pugnacious to get along in that environment. Amid the chaos of fourteen people living in a mobile home (not a double-wide), she turned fifteen, dropped out of school, and ran away from home. Being homeless, then working minimum wage jobs quickly grew old. She earned a high school equivalency diploma, went to college, where she met her husband, the father of their two wonderful now-grown children. She started in television news as a reporter, eventually working her way up to news director and general manager before deciding what she really wanted to do is write mysteries.