Mary Marks

Mary Marks grew up in Los Angeles and the San Francisco Bay Area. She became an award winning quilter after retiring from an administrative job at UCLA. Writing about her quilts led her in a new creative direction, writing cozy mysteries.

"I always heard that the best stories come from writing what you know, so Martha Rose is loosely modeled after me: a divorced, overweight Jewish quilter of a certain age who lives in the San Fernando Valley."

The smart but impulsive Martha Rose is aided and abetted by her best friends Lucy and Birdie and a cast of quirky characters.

The author is an unrepentant Hidden Object game player and Sudoku addict. "Solving puzzles, finding patterns, piecing things together--that's what quilters and mystery writers do all the time," says the author.

The author lives on the California coast with her husband, Tim Palmer, and her orange cat Louie.