N.L. Holmes

N.L. Holmes is the pen name of a professional archaeologist who received her doctorate from Bryn Mawr College. She has excavated in Greece and in Israel, and taught ancient history and humanities at the university level for many years. She has always had a passion for books, and in childhood, she and her cousin (also a writer today) used to write stories for fun.

The inspiration for her Bronze Age novels came with an assignment she gave to her students one day: here are the only documents we have telling us about a certain royal divorce in Ugarit in the 13th century. How much can we say about what happened? It quickly became apparent that almost anything we might come up with was as much fiction as historiography! Her Lord Hani Mysteries was a finalist for Best Series of 2021 in the Next Generation Indie Book Awards, and Bird in a Snare was the Grand Prize winner of the Chaucer Book Award for best historical fiction before 1750 in 2021. Her books have also won the 2023 Wishing Shelf Award for adult novels.

Today, since their son is grown, she lives with her husband, three cats and a bunch of geese and chickens in northern France, where she gardens, weaves, plays the violin, dances, and occasionally drives a jog-cart. And reads, of course.