Jack O'Brien

I’ve spent much of my life looking for the story beneath the surface.

For forty years, I worked as an advertising writer and creative director. The work taught me to pay attention: to what people say, what they mean, and what they hope nobody notices. It also taught me the value of getting to the point. Readers owe a writer nothing. You have to give them a reason to stay.

Writing novels gave me room to follow questions that couldn’t be answered in thirty seconds.

With Caesarion, the question was what might happen if the son of Cleopatra and Julius Caesar had survived—and left an account that contradicted the history we inherited. Three years of research and writing took me into ancient courtrooms, across the Mediterranean, and beneath Herculaneum. Along the way, I became as interested in the people trying to uncover the truth as in the people trying to bury it.

That’s what draws me to a story: someone wants to understand, someone has something to lose, and neither can simply walk away.

I grew up near Lake Erie in northwestern Pennsylvania, spent twenty years in Pittsburgh, and now live in The Villages, Florida. I paint, talk with other writers, and keep finding things I want to learn more about. My wife and I met in high school. We still hold hands.

There are more stories to tell. I’m working on them.

Jack and Pam O’Brien have three children and three grandchildren.