The Authors
Tori Eldridge is the Anthony, Lefty, and Macavity Awards-nominated author of the Lily Wong mystery thriller series—The Ninja Daughter, The Ninja’s Blade, and The Ninja Betrayed (out 9/14/21)—and her upcoming dark Brazilian fantasy, Dance Among the Flames, set for a May 2022 release. Tori’s shorter works appear in horror, dystopian, and other literary anthologies, including the inaugural reboot of Weird Tales magazine. Her screenplay The Gift earned a semi-finalist spot for the Academy Nicholl Fellowship.
Before writing, Tori performed as an actress, singer, dancer on Broadway, television, and film. She is of Hawaiian, Chinese, Norwegian descent and was born and raised in Honolulu where she graduated from Punahou School with classmate Barack Obama. Tori holds a fifth-degree black belt in To-Shin Do ninjutsu and has traveled the USA teaching seminars on the ninja arts, weapons, and women’s self-protection.
Learn more at torieldridge.com.
Lori Rader-Day is the Edgar® Award-nominated and Anthony and Mary Higgins Clark award-winning author of Death at Greenway (forthcoming October 2021), The Lucky One, Under a Dark Sky, The Day I Died, Little Pretty Things, and The Black Hour. She lives in Chicago, where she is co-chair of the mystery readers’ conference Murder and Mayhem in Chicago and the immediate past national president of Sisters in Crime.
Her short fiction has been previously published in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, TimeOut Chicago, Crab Orchard Review, Freight Stories, and in the anthologies Dia de los Muertos (Elektrik Milkbath Press), Unloaded 2 (Down and Out Books), and Murder-a-Go-Go’s (Down and Out Books). Bestselling author Jodi Picoult chose her story as the grand prize winner of Good Housekeeping’s first fiction contest in 2010.
Originally from central Indiana, she grew up frequenting the local libraries, reading all the Beverly Cleary, Judy Blume, and Lois Duncan she could get my hands on. Then she discovered Agatha Christie and Mary Higgins Clark. She may have wandered off the mystery writer path a few times, but she thinks we all knew she would get back there eventually. Learn more at loriraderday.com.
Jonathan Santlofer is an author and artist. His newst novel The Last Mona Lisa will be published by Sourcebook Landmark on August 17, 2021. He is the author of the memoir The Widower’s Notebook, the international bestselling novel, The Death Artist, as well as Color Blind, The Killing Art, The Murder Notebook, and Anatomy of Fear, which won the Nero Award for best crime novel of 2009. He recently created and edited The New York Times “Notable Book,” It Occurs To Me that I Am America, a collection of original work by more than 50 of today’s best known authors and artists.
He is editor/contributor of The New York Times best selling serial novel Inherit the Dead, editor and contributor of LA NOIRE: The Collected Stories, Akashic Books’ The Marijuana Chronicles, and co-editor, contributor and illustrator of the short story anthology, The Dark End of the Street. His stories appear in numerous collections, including The Rich & the Dead, edited by Nelson De Mille, New Jersey Noir, edited by Joyce Carol Oates, Lawrence Block’s two bestselling anthologies, In Sunlight and In Shadow and Alive In Form and Color. His stories have also appeared in such publications as Ellery Queen Magazine and the Strand Magazine.
Jonathan is the recipient of two National Endowment for the Arts grants, has been a Visiting Artist at the American Academy In Rome, the Vermont Studio Center, and serves on the board of Yaddo, one of the oldest arts communities in the U.S. Learn more at jonathansantlofer.com.
Lisa Unger is a New York Times and internationally bestselling author. With books published in thirty languages and millions of copies sold worldwide, she is widely regarded as a master of suspense. Her latest release, Last Girl Ghosted, publishes October 5.
Unger’s critically acclaimed books have been named on “Best Book” lists from the Today show, Good Morning America, Entertainment Weekly, People, Amazon, Goodreads, and many others. She has been nominated for, or won, numerous awards including the Hammett Prize, Macavity, Thriller Award, and Goodreads Choice. In 2019, she received two Edgar Award nominations, an honor held by only a few authors, including Agatha Christie. Her writing has appeared in The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, NPR, and Travel+Leisure.
She lives on the west coast of Florida with her family. Learn more at lisaunger.com.
Authors’ Books
The Ninja Betrayed by Tori Eldridge
Things get personal for Chinese-Norwegian modern-day ninja Lily Wong in Hong Kong when she dives into the dangerous world of triads, romance, and corporate disaster during the height of the pro-democracy protests.
Lily’s mother has been summoned by her grandfather, Gung-Gung to attend an emergency board meeting. Lily is happy to take her father’s place for exotic travel, family reunions, and romantic dates with her new boyfriend, Daniel Kwok, who’s there for business. Lily and her mother stay at her grandparents’ hillside home on Hong Kong Island, but tension between Gung-Gung and Ma makes it hard to enjoy the beautiful surroundings, especially with the city in turmoil. Gung-Gung won’t say anything about the meeting and Ma is worried that her career is in jeopardy. Meanwhile, the teenage daughter of Gung-Gung’s driver is pulled into the dangerous riots.
As Lily and Ma discover shaky finances, questionable loans, and plans for the future involving them both, Lily’s escalating romance with Daniel puts her heart at risk. Will her ninja skills allow her to protect her mother, the family business, and the renegade teen while navigating love, corporate intrigue, and murderous triads?
Purchase at an independent bookstore near you.
Purchase online at www.bookshop.org.
Death At Greenway by Lori Rader-Day
Bridey Kelly has come to Greenway House—the beloved holiday home of Agatha Christie—in disgrace. A terrible mistake at St. Prisca’s Hospital in London has led to her dismissal as a nurse trainee, and her only chance for redemption is a position in the countryside caring for children evacuated to safety from the Blitz.
Greenway is a beautiful home full of riddles: wondrous curios not to be touched, restrictions on rooms not to be entered, and a generous library, filled with books about murder. The biggest mystery might be the other nurse, Gigi, who is like no one Bridey has ever met. Chasing ten young children through the winding paths of the estate grounds might have soothed Bridey’s anxieties and grief—if Greenway were not situated so near the English Channel and the rising aggressions of the war.
When a body washes ashore near the estate, Bridey is horrified to realize this is not a victim of war, but of a brutal killing. As the local villagers look among themselves, Bridey and Gigi discover they each harbor dangerous secrets about what has led them to Greenway. With a mystery writer’s home as their unsettling backdrop, the young women must unravel the truth before their safe haven becomes a place of death . . .
Purchase at an independent bookstore near you.
Purchase online at www.bookshop.org.
The Last Mona Lisa by Jonathan Santlofer
ONE OF PEOPLE MAGAZINE’S BEST BOOKS OF SUMMER
August, 1911: The Mona Lisa is stolen by Vincent Peruggia. Exactly what happens in the two years before its recovery is a mystery. Many replicas of the Mona Lisa exist, and more than one historian has wondered if the painting now returned to the Louvre is a fake, switched in 1911.
Present day: Art professor Luke Perrone digs for the truth behind his most famous ancestor: Peruggia. His search attracts an Interpol detective with something to prove and an unfamiliar but curiously helpful woman. Soon, Luke tumbles deep into the world of art and forgery, a land of obsession and danger.
Purchase at an independent bookstore near you.
Purchase online at www.bookshop.org.
Last Girl Ghosted by Lisa Unger
She met him through a dating app. An intriguing picture on a screen, a date at a downtown bar. What she thought might be just a quick hookup quickly became much more. She fell for him–hard. It happens sometimes, a powerful connection with a perfect stranger takes you by surprise. Could it be love?
But then, just as things were getting real, he stood her up. Then he disappeared–profiles deleted, phone disconnected. She was ghosted.
Maybe it was her fault. She shared too much, too fast. But isn’t that always what women think–that they’re the ones to blame? Soon she learns there were others. Girls who thought they were in love. Girls who later went missing. She had been looking for a connection, but now she’s looking for answers. Chasing a digital trail into his dark past–and hers–she finds herself on a dangerous hunt. And she’s not sure whether she’s the predator–or the prey.
Purchase at an independent bookstore near you.
Purchase online at www.bookshop.org.
Your Hosts
Karen Dionne is the USA Today and #1 internationally bestselling author of the award-winning psychological suspense novel The Marsh King’s Daughter, published by G.P. Putnam’s Sons in the US and in 26 other languages. Her follow up novel, The Wicked Sister (August 2020, G.P. Putnam’s Sons), is also an international bestseller and was chosen by Publishers Weekly as one of their Best Books of 2020.
The Marsh King’s Daughter was also chosen as one of the best books of 2017 by iBooks, Hudson Booksellers, The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, The Irish Independent, Library Journal, Shelf Awareness and many other booksellers and reviewers, and is soon to be a major motion picture starring Daisy Ridley and Ben Mendelsohn.
Both The Wicked Sister and The Marsh King’s Daughter were selected by the Library of Michigan as Michigan Notable Books, and The Marsh King’s Daughter took home the Barry and the Crimson Scribe Awards for Best Novel. Visit Karen at www.karen-dionne.com
Karen’s newest novel is The Wicked Sister. “Dionne paints a haunting portrait of a family hurtling toward the tragic destiny they can foresee but are powerless to stop.”–Publishers Weekly (starred review)
Purchase The Wicked Sister at an independent bookstore near you.
Purchase The Wicked Sister online at www.bookshop.org.
Hank Phillippi Ryan is the USA Today bestselling author of thirteen novels of suspense. She has won five Agathas, four Anthonys, two Macavitys, the Daphne, and the coveted Mary Higgins Clark award. National reviews have called her a “master at crafting suspenseful mysteries” and “a superb and gifted storyteller.” Her 2019 book The Murder List won the Anthony Award for Best Novel of the year. Her 2020 book is The First to Lie, of which the Publishers Weekly starred review said, “Stellar. Ryan could win a sixth Agatha with this one.” It is now a nominee for the Anthony Award and the Mary Higgins Clark Award.
Hank is also an award-winning investigative reporter at Boston’s WHDH-TV. In addition to 37 EMMYs and 14 Edward R. Murrow awards, Hank’s won dozens of other honors for her ground-breaking journalism. Hank is the co-host of First Chapter Fun, hosts the online mystery interview program for the acclaimed A Mighty Blaze, is a founding teacher at Mystery Writers of America University and served as past president of national Sisters in Crime. Learn more at www.HankPhillippiRyan.com.
Hank’s upcoming novel, Her Perfect Life, will be published September 14, 2021, with starred reviews from Kirkus and Publishers Weekly. “Superlative…this is a fast-paced, surprise-packed treat.” ―Publishers Weekly (starred review)
Purchase Her Perfect Life at an independent bookstore near you.
Purchase Her Perfect Life online at www.bookshop.org.
