Nancy Boyarsky Books in Order

Nancy Boyarsky was born in Oakland, California, and grew up with her parents and two sisters in East Oakland. As a child, she was allowed to roam the neighborhood on her own, and trips to the small Alandale Public Library were the highlight of her week. Books were part of her everyday life early on.

She attended Oakland public schools, then chose to go to UC Berkeley despite her father's belief that girls should skip college and prepare for domestic life. Boyarsky supported herself by working in the campus library, where student clerks could slip into the stacks and read when things were quiet. She graduated with honors in English literature.

Her first job was as an associate editor at a small San Francisco publishing house. After she and her husband, journalist Bill Boyarsky, had two daughters, she stayed home with the children and began freelancing for a local paper. The couple also worked together on magazine pieces.

Books, journalism, and California politics kept meeting in her work.

The family spent ten years in Sacramento while Bill covered the state capital and political campaigns. They later moved to Los Angeles when he joined the staff of the Los Angeles Times. Once her daughters were teenagers, Boyarsky returned to full-time work, first as an associate editor at Los Angeles Lawyer magazine and then as communications director for political affairs at ARCO.

She left ARCO after becoming a grandmother and focused on writing and editing. Along with Bill, she coauthored Backroom Politics, a New York Times notable book. Her nonfiction work also includes textbooks on the justice system, political anthologies such as In the Running, and articles for publications including the Los Angeles Times, Forbes, McCall's, and West magazine.

Boyarsky later turned to mystery fiction with the Nicole Graves books. The Swap sends Nicole Lewis from Los Angeles to London for a home exchange that becomes a dangerous missing-persons puzzle. The Bequest and Liar Liar move through powerful Los Angeles workplaces and a tense court case, while The Ransom and The Moscow Affair take Nicole into kidnapping and international espionage. Her stories often put capable women up against secrets hidden by money, status, and people who would rather not be questioned.

Not all mysteries start with a detective badge.

The Swap won a 2018 Eric Hoffer Award. Outside her novels, Boyarsky has also produced and directed the podcast Inside Golden State Politics. She lives in Los Angeles with Bill, and her long connection to the city, its politics, and its everyday pressures gives the Nicole Graves cases a grounded local feel.