Gary Jennings was known for the rigorous and intensive research behind his books, which often included hazardous travel-exploring every corner of Mexico for his Aztec novels, retracing the numerous wanderings of Marco Polo for The Journeyers, joining nine different circuses for Spangle, and roaming the Balkans for Raptor. Born in Buena Vista, Virginia in 1928, Jennings passed away in 1999 in Pompton Lakes, New Jersey, leaving behind a rich legacy of historical fiction and outlines for new novels.

Robert Gleason, author of End of Days, has worked for 40 years in the New York book industry, where he has published many scientists, politicians and military experts. He starred in and hosted a two-hour History Channel special, largely devoted to nuclear terrorism and has discussed the subject on many national TV/radio talk shows, including Sean Hannity’s and Lou Dobbs’s TV shows and George Noory’s Coast to Coast AM. He has also spoken on nuclear terrorism at major universities, including Harvard.

Junius Podrug is the author of Frost of Heaven, Presumed Guilty, and The Disaster Survival Bible. He has experienced two major earthquakes, a flash flood, a blizzard of historical significance, a shipboard emergency, and a crazy with a gun. He considers his paranoia to be heightened awareness and habitually checks where the life vests are stored when boarding a ship and where the fire escapes are located before unpacking in a hotel room. He lives in Cape Cod, Massachusetts.