Tania Bayard is a freelance writer and lecturer specializing in medieval art, culture, and horticulture. She has taught art history at Fordham, Rutgers, and Hofstra universities and is the author of a number of books, including A Medieval Home Companion: Housekeeping in the Fourteenth Century. Previously, she was the curator of the Biblical Garden at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York City and assistant horticulturist at The Cloisters, a branch of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. This is her first work of fiction.