About Donna Gillespie

Donna Gillespie is the author of two historical novels set in first century Rome, The Light Bearer (Berkley/Putnam, 1994) and Lady of the Light (Berkley/Putnam, 2006). The Light Bearer has been translated into German, Dutch, Russian, Italian and Lithuanian. An international bestseller, it was optioned by Hallmark Entertainment for a miniseries. Her second novel, Lady of the Light, is the sequel to The Light Bearer, and is also available in German and Italian. Her love of historical novels began at age thirteen when she discovered Mary Renault's novel of ancient Greece, The King Must Die. She credits the novels of Robert Graves -- I Claudius and Claudius the God -- with her enduring interest in the culture and mores of ancient Rome. She has lived in San Francisco since 1971, where she presently is the copyeditor and occasional contributor to her neighborhood newspaper, The New Fillmore. She’s currently working on the third novel of the trilogy that began with The Light Bearer.