Brandon Philips

Brandon Philips grew up in East Boston, Massachusetts, a one time Irish-Italian ghetto, but as a young adult, moved on to explore the wider world. With scholarship support, he followed his deep interest in French, Chinese and Russian languages and history and graduated from Boston College and the University of Hawaii. His extensive travels in Europe and the Asian-Pacific world gave him solid, real-life material on culture and politics for adaptation in his novels, particularly so in The Empress Ruby. Among other adventures, he has zip-lined off the Great Wall of China; explored the location of Marco Polo's home on the island of Korcula, Croatia; taught college in southern China; checked out great collections of ancient gold treasure in leading museums; descended into the Imperial Hapsburg crypts in Vienna; climbed in and out of tall-spired temples at Bagan, Myanmar and, most dangerous and death-defying of all, taught 7th graders for five years in California. Readers will sense an eye-witness quality to Philips' writing as he takes them around the world with his characters in search of treasure, from grand settings in Europe to rugged terrain in Central and Southeast Asia. Philips lives in Hawaii and spends part of the year in California.