Mary Strand is a novelist and songwriter. She practiced law in a large Minneapolis firm for 16 years until she escaped the land of mergers and acquisitions to write novels. She writes YA, romantic comedy, and women’s fiction novels. Her first novel, Cooper’s Folly, won RWA’s Golden Heart award. She has published a 4-book Bennet Sisters YA series, and in 2022 she published her Pendulum women’s fiction trilogy. Strand lives on a lake in Minneapolis with her husband, two cute kidlets, and a stuffed monkey named Philip. When not writing, she lives for sports, travel, guitar, fruity cocktails, and ill-advised adventures that offer a high probability of injury to herself and others.