Jill Churchill

Jill Churchill (born Janice Young Brooks January 11, 1943 in Kansas City, Missouri) is an American author, winner of the Agatha and Macavity Awards for her first Jane Jeffrey novel and featured in Great Women Mystery Writers (2007).

Churchill earned a degree in education from the University of Kansas in 1965 and then studied at the University of Missouri-Kansas City before teaching in elementary school for some years. Between 1978 and 1992, she was book reviewer for the Kansas City Star. Now divorced, she lives in Kansas.

She published several historical novels under her real name before introducing a new series in 1989. This mystery series follows Jane Jeffry, a widow with three children living in suburban Chicago. With her neighbor and best friend Shelley Nowack, she gets caught up in murder cases. These often involve Mel Van Dyne, a police detective introduced in the first novel. The novel titles are puns on literary works and reflect Jeffry's cozy domestic life which she leads between crime-solving capers.

In 1999, Churchill began a new mystery series set during the Great Depression, which features siblings Robert and Lily Brewster who live in New York. They've inherited a house from their great-uncle, which they run as a guest house to earn money.