Chicks Kick Butt

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

L. A. BANKS (aka Leslie Esdaile Banks) is a native of Philadelphia and a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania Wharton undergraduate program, and holds a masters in fine arts from Temple University’s School of Film and Media Arts. After a ten-year career as a corporate marketing executive for several Fortune 100 high-tech firms, Banks changed careers in 1991 to pursue a private consulting career—which ultimately led to fiction and film writing. Now, with over twenty-eight novels plus twelve anthology contributions in an extraordinary breadth of genres, and many awards to her credit, Banks writes full-time and resides in Philadelphia. Look for her Vampire Huntress Legends series and a full listing of her published works at: www.vampire-huntress.com or www.LeslieEsdaileBanks.com .

JENNA BLACK graduated from Duke University with a degree in physical anthropology and French. Once upon a time, she dreamed she would be the next Jane Goodall, camping in the bush and making fascinating discoveries about primate behavior. Then during her senior year at Duke, she did some actual research in the field, and her fascinating discovery was this: primates spend most of their time doing such exciting things as eating and sleeping. Concluding that this discovery was her life’s work in the field of primatology, she then moved on to such varied pastimes as grooming dogs and writing technical documentation. She is now a full-time writer of fantasy, romance, and young adult fiction.

KAREN CHANCE grew up in Orlando, Florida, the home of make-believe, which probably explains a lot. She has since resided in several cities around the world, mostly goofing off, but occasionally writing novels in her Cassandra Palmer and Midnight Daughter series. Her short fiction has appeared in several anthologies, including Inked , On the Prowl , and Wolfsbane and Mistletoe . She is currently back in Florida, where she plans to continue writing while dodging hurricanes.

ROXANNE CONRAD has published more than thirty novels, including (as Rachel Caine) the New York Times and USA Today bestselling Morganville Vampires series, as well as the popular Weather Warden and Outcast Season series. She is also a contributor to several bestselling anthologies. She lives in Fort Worth, Texas, with her husband, fantasy artist R. Cat Conrad.

“Wimpy” Gothic novel heroines sent CAROLE NELSON DOUGLAS on a sixty-novel mission of creating strong women protagonists in genres from science fiction and fantasy to historical and contemporary-set mystery and romance. “The first woman” in several journalism areas while reporting for the St. Paul Pioneer Press, she became the first author to use a woman from the Sherlock Holmes stories as a protagonist, with the New York Times Notable Book of the Year Good Night, Mr. Holmes. Whether her woman characters have paranormal powers like Delilah Street, or run on brains and nerve like Irene Adler, they all enjoy being girls and showing the boys how it’s done. Publishers Weekly starred reviews for Dancing with Werewolves and Brimstone Kiss launched the Delilah Street noir urban fantasy series, which is set in an apocalyptic Las Vegas vastly different from the contemporary Vegas of Douglas’s long-running Midnight Louie feline PI cozy-noir series.

P. N. ELROD writes and edits, and is best known for The Vampire Files, where Bobbi Smythe hangs out with her undead boyfriend, vampire PI Jack Fleming. Elrod is a hopeless chocolate addict and cheerfully refuses all efforts at intervention. More about her toothy titles may be found at www.vampwriter.com .

NANCY HOLDER is the New York Times bestselling author of the Wicked series (with coauthor Debbie Viguie). Crusade: Damned, the second book in their new series, Crusade, will be out in August 2011. The first book of their new series, Unleashed: The Wolf Springs Chronicles, will debut in January of 2012. She is also the author of the young adult horror series, Possessions. The Screaming Season, third in the series, hit the shelves in March 2011. She lives in San Diego with her daughter, Belle, and their corgis, Panda and Tater, and two very hairy cats named David and Kittnen Snow Vampire.

Trained as an artist with a BFA in illustration from the California College of Arts and Crafts, SUSAN KRINARD became a writer in 1992 when a friend read a short story she’d written and suggested she try writing a romance novel. A longtime fan of science fiction and fantasy, Susan began reading romance—and realized what she wanted to do was combine the two genres. Prince of Wolves, her first romance novel and one of the earliest to feature a werewolf hero, was the result. Within a year Susan had sold the manuscript to Bantam as part of a three-book contract, and the novel went on to make several bestseller lists. Since then, she’s written and published over fourteen paranormal and fantasy novels, and written stories for a number of anthologies, both fantasy and romance. Both the anthology Out of This World (which included Susan’s “Kinsman”) and the novel Lord of the Beasts appeared on the New York Times bestseller list. Susan makes her home in New Mexico, the “Land of Enchantment,” with her husband, Serge; their dogs Freya, Nahla, and Cagney; and their cat, Jefferson. In addition to writing, Susan’s interests include music of almost every kind, old movies, reading, nature, baking, and collecting unique handmade jewelry and decorative crafts.

New York Times and USA Today bestselling author CHEYENNE McCRAY has a passion for writing suspense and urban fantasy novels. Among many other awards, Chey has won the prestigious RT Book Reviews Reviewers’ Choice Award twice and has had her books nominated four times. A University of Arizona alumnus, Cheyenne McCray has been writing ever since she can remember, back to her kindergarten days, when she penned her first poem. She began to pursue publication seriously after starting her first young adult novel in January 2000. For two years Cheyenne wrote primarily young adult paranormal fiction under a pseudonym. While she loved writing young adult fiction, she found herself wanting to explore adult relationships and started writing paranormal romance and romantic suspense, also branching out to suspense/thrillers and urban fantasy. She has written eleven novels and two novellas for St. Martin’s Press. In 2009 her thrilling new Lexi Steele suspense novels debuted with The First Sin. Then Demons Not Included kicked off her exciting urban fantasy Night Tracker series. Both series debuted to acclaim by readers and reviewers, and landed on multiple bestseller lists. Be sure to go to http://cheyennemccray.com to sign up for her private book announcement list and to get free, exclusive Cheyenne McCray goodies. Please feel free to e-mail her at chey@cheyennemccray.com. She would love to hear from you.

LILITH SAINTCROW is the author of the Dante Valentine, Jill Kismet, and Strange Angels series. She currently resides in Vancouver, Washington, with her children, cats, and assorted other strays.

JEANNE C. STEIN is the bestselling author of the urban fantasy series the Anna Strong Vampire Chronicles. Last April, her character, Anna Strong, received an RT Book Reviewers Choice Award for Best Urban Fantasy Protagonist. The sixth in the Anna Strong series, Chosen, will be released in August.

ELIZABETH A. VAUGHAN is the author of The Chronicles of the Warlands series, Dagger-Star, and Destiny’s Star . She still believes that the only good movies are the ones with gratuitous swords or lasers. Not to mention dragons. At the present, she is owned by two incredibly spoiled cats and lives in the Northwest Territory, on the outskirts of the Black Swamp, along Mad Anthony’s Trail on the banks of the Maumee River.

RACHEL VINCENT is the author of the urban fantasy series Shifters and the young adult Soul Screamers books. Rachel has a BA in English and an overactive imagination, and consistently finds the latter to be more practical. She shares her workspace with two black cats (Kaci and Nyx) and her number one fan. Rachel is older than she looks—seriously—and younger than she feels, but remains convinced that for every day she spends writing, one more day will be added to her lifespan.