Tina deBellegarde is a two-time Agatha Award nominee for her Batavia-on-Hudson Mysteries. Autumn Embers, the most recent addition to the series, takes place in Kyoto. Her short stories have been nominated for an Agatha Award and a Derringer Award. Tina co-chairs the Murderous March virtual writers conference. She enjoys reviewing Japanese fiction for Books on Asia, and is the Membership Coordinator of Writers in Kyoto. Tina travels to Kyoto regularly to visit her son Alessandro and to do research. She is currently working on a collection of interconnected short stories and a new series, both set in Japan. Tina’s background includes work as a library clerk, a paralegal, an exporter and eighteen years as a middle school language teacher. When she isn’t writing, she is helping her husband tend their beehives, harvest shiitakes from their mushroom logs, or tend their vegetable garden. She makes lampworked glass beads and contributes to her husband’s jewelry designs. For Tina, baking and cooking are her favorite forms of meditation.