Biography of Elizabeth George  
Susan Elizabeth George was born on February 26, 1949, in Warren, Ohio, to Robert Edwin, an estimator for a conveyor company, and Anne (Rivelle) George, a nurse. She married Ira Toibin, an education administrator, on May 28, 1971, but unfortunately,  they divorced in November 1995. She received an A.A. from Foothill Community College in 1969, a B.A. in 1970 from the University of California at Riverside, and an M.S. from California State University in 1979. Elizabeth later married Jim and they have two married daughters, Katherine (28) and Courtney (27) along with two new grandchildren.

Elizabeth, who holds a Bachelor of Science in education from the University of Oklahoma, has taught English at several California high schools and has conducted creative writing courses at Coastline College (Costa Mesa, CA), Irvine Valley College (Irvine, CA), and the University of California, Irvine. She was selected Teacher of the Year by the Orange County Department of Education in 1981.

Her first published novel, A Great Deliverance, won the prestigious Anthony and Agatha awards, was nominated for an Edgar and a Macavity, and received the French LeGrande prix de Litterature Policiere. Well-Schooled in Murder won the German MIMI, which recognizes outstanding international mystery books.

Elizabeth George's novels are published in 21 languages. “Playing for the Ashes” was her first New York Times bestseller. Her latest book, “Deception on His Mind”, is the Main Selection of both the Book of the Month Club and the British Book of the Month Club. She wrote “A Great Deliverance” in 21 days.

In all the novels George’s plots are multilayered, the group of suspects large and varied, and the relationships between the characters extraordinarily complex. The crimes are violent and the depiction of them realistic, so that, while George’s milieux are often reminiscent of the English “cozy” tradition, her subjects and her sexual, social, and psychological concerns put her work in a much more modern, more intense subgenre. She is skilled in shifting suspicion from one character to another, but, in the end, those who turn out not to be the chief villain are nevertheless guilty of secondary offenses so that their earlier positions as potential candidates for the role of major criminal do not seem artificially contrived.

Without George’s command of the mystery plot and all that that implies, her work woulddoubtless not receive the respect and popularity that it does; but, actually, the cast ofcontinuing characters, the relationships between and among them, and the ways in which theirlives and problems are interwoven with the main plot, may well be an equally strong element inher appeal.