Leonie Swann grew up near Munich and earned degrees in philosophy, communications, and psychology from Munich University and the Munich School of Philosophy. Her debut novel, Three Bags Full, has been translated into twenty-six languages and won the prestigious Glauser Prize for crime fiction in the debut category, as well as the PETA Award. She has now published six books, including the Agnes Sharp series, and lives and works in the English countryside near Cambridge.

Anthea Bell (1936-2018) was a translator from French and German. She translated many novels, including W. G. Sebald's Austerlitz and Franz Kafka's The Castle, as well as novellas and stories by Stefan Zweig. She won the National Book Critics Circle Award in 2012.