J.S. Borthwick (pseudonym for Jean Scott Wood Creighton) was born in Buffalo, NY, and was studying at the State University of New York in Buffalo when WWII broke out; she left school to work as a nurse. After marriage and three children, she went back to college, and ultimately taught English in the Maine high-school system and at Indiana University. Along the way-and over twenty-five years-she wrote thirteen books in the much-loved Sarah Deane series, all of them literate, witty, and rich in twisty plotting. She died in Maine, in 2018.