Frances McNamara grew up in Boston, where her father served as Police Commissioner for ten years. She has degrees from Mount Holyoke and Simmons Colleges, and recently retired from the University of Chicago. She now divides her time between Boston and Cape Cod.

Author of The Emily Cabot Mysteries about a social activist in Chicago in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Frances is Secretary of Sisters in Crime New England and active in MWA New England. Death in a Time of Spanish Flu is set in Chicago in 1918 will be released September 20, 2022.

A second series featuring "Mother of Forensic Science" Frances Glessner Lee will be published by Level Best Books. The first in the series Molasses Murder in a Nutshell will be released in December 2022.