Daisy Pettles is the pen name of Vicky Phillips, born in Bedford, Indiana and raised in the tiny farming community of Medora, where her parents ran the corner gas station and ice cream stand. She learned to read while sitting on her grandmother's lap, under an apple tree in Brownstown, Indiana. As a child, she was fed a steady diet of books, pies, and Bible stories. After graduating from Medora High School in 1977, she attended DePauw University, where she was graduated Phi Beta Kappa. A world traveler, she has lived in San Francisco, London and Athens. She has raced camels in Egypt and eaten Kentucky Fried Chicken with Communists in Shanghai. She was a therapist before becoming an Internet entrepreneur, designing America's first online university counseling system in 1989. She currently lives in a cloud of peace and quiet at the end of a dirt road in Vermont. For all her travels, she remains a Hoosier at heart. She loves persimmon pudding and feel-good stories where Good stomps all over Evil. The Shady Hoosier Detective Agency, a humorous crime cozy series set in the fictitious small town of Knobby Waters, Indiana, is her debut mystery series.