Leadership Team
Joan Mularz, President
Joan Wright Mularz writes mysteries because she loves puzzles. Her books are YA mysteries because the teen years are so full of emotion—from soaring highs to heart-breaking lows. The stories are not just for teens though. They’re for anyone who appreciates a youthful perspective and good writing.
Linda Gordon Hengerer, Vice President/Treasurer
Linda Gordon Hengerer is the author of the Beach Tea Shop mystery series and several non-fiction books; with Joanna Campbell Slan, Linda co-edited seven editions of the Happy Homicides cozy mystery anthology series. A New Jersey native transplanted to Florida, she is currently the President of the Sisters in Crime-Florida Treasure Coast Chapter. A long-time baker, she enjoys creating new recipes that don’t take forever to make.
Neliza Drew, Secretary
Neliza Drew used to write ad copy before turning to crime (fiction). She spent more than seven years in juvenile detention (as a teacher). When not writing, she used to teach kids how to punch each other (at a dojo).
Her debut novel, All the Bridges Burning was called “hauntingly real.” “Her short stories have appeared in the anthologies Protectors 2: Heroes and Feeding Kate.
Neliza lives in South Florida with her husband, ducks, and too many cats. She can be found online at nelizadrew.com and on social media as @nelizadrew
Members
Diane A.S. Stuckart
DIANE A.S. STUCKART began her writing career in the 1990s as the critically acclaimed author of historical romance under the names Alexa Smart and Anna Gerard. She later switched to the mystery genre and is the New York Times bestselling author of the Black Cat Bookshop Mystery series written as Ali Brandon.
Additionally, Diane is the author of the award-winning Leonardo da Vinci historical mysteries, which received starred reviews from Library Journal and Publishers Weekly, as well as a Florida Book Award for the second in the series, PORTRAIT OF A LADY. She’s also penned several mystery, fantasy, and romance short stories that have appeared in various anthologies and magazines.
Diane’s latest ventures include the Tarot Cats Mystery series set in a West Palm Beach botanica and stars a pair of clever feline detectives.
Her Georgia B&B Mystery series, written as Anna Gerard, features an innkeeper-turned-sleuth in a fictional tourist town west of Savannah. Book 3 in that series, PEACHES AND SCHEMES, is her 18th published novel and was released in 2021.
A member of Mystery Writers of America, Diane served as the 2018 and 2019 Chapter President of the MWA Florida chapter. She’s also a member of Sisters in Crime and the Cat Writers’ Association. Outside her writing life, she’s an avid thrifter with shops on Etsy and eBay and is a member and current secretary of the Palm Beach County Beekeepers Association. Diane is a native Texan with a degree in Journalism from the University of Oklahoma but has been living in the West Palm Beach, FL area since 2006. She shares her “almost in the Everglades” home with her husband, dogs, cats, and a few beehives