Jack Sussek was born in California, raised on the East Coast, and graduated from the George Washington University in Washington, DC. He has worked in the timber business in the Pacific Northwest and in Australia, and in surveillance and counter-surveillance in Europe, the Middle East, and Afghanistan. He moderates a literary salon in New York City at the Lotos Club, founded in 1870. among whose early members were Mark Twain and Andrew Carnegie. Some of his guests have been Erica Jong, Alan Furst, and Paul Auster. In the spring he published his first novel, Manhattan Affair. He lives in New York City with his wife and son.