Dianne Emley, author of the bestselling Detective Nan Vining series, was born in Los Angeles, California. Except for her junior year in college when she studied at the Université de Bordeaux, France, she has always lived in and around Los Angeles. She has a BA in philosophy and an MBA in marketing, both from UCLA. She has held jobs as varied as drill press operator, polling place recruiter, California Department of Consumer Affairs complaint handler, clothing boutique buyer, egg and poultry industry marketer, software company sales manager, and technical writer. While having traveled the world, she lives five miles from where she grew up with her husband Charlie and two cats and is gleefully happy with her favorite and last profession: crime writer.