Idaho Sisters in Crime: Carmen Amato, Lessons from a 30-year CIA Veteran

Idaho Sisters in Crime: Carmen Amato, Lessons from a 30-year CIA Veteran

Thursday, November 9, 2023, 5:00 pm

Zoom Online Presentation

www.idahosinc.com

Mystery and Thriller author, Carmen Amato is a retired Central Intelligence Agency officer. She is a recipient of both the National Intelligence Award and Career Intelligence Medal. Previously head of a U.S. National Intelligence Tradecraft School, she also headed an intelligence collection program with responsibility across the Western Hemisphere.

Carmen draws on her counter drug and espionage experiences to craft intrigue filled crime fiction, notably the award winning Detective Emilia Cruz police series. Emilia is the first female police detective in Acapulco, confronting Mexico’s cartels, corruption and social inequalities. The series won the Poison Cup Award for Outstanding Series from Crime Masters of America in both 2019 and 2020 and has been optioned for television.

If you love international police procedural series by Ian Rankin, Jo Nesbo, Ann Cleeves, Peter May, Louise Penny, and Jussi Adler-Olsen, you’ll want to read the Detective Emilia Cruz series. It’s a must read for fans of Don Winslow’s cartel and border thrillers set in Mexico, as is her standalone thriller, The Hidden Light of Mexico City.

Originally from upstate New York, Carmen’s experiences in Mexico and Central America launched her fiction career. She holds a BA (cum laude) in history and political science from LeMoyne College and a Masters in International Relations from the University of Virginia as well as certificates of completion from Institut Catholique in Paris, France, and Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government.

Her family tree includes a mayor, a Mensa genius, and the first homicide in the state of Connecticut with an automatic weapon. The perpetrator, her great-grandfather, eluded a statewide manhunt after killing two people, one of whom was his wife. He was never brought to justice.

See why Amazon Hall of Fame reviewer Grady Harp wrote: “For pure entertainment and a gripping story likely resulting in nail-biting, read Carmen Amato’s addictive prose. She knows this territory like a jaguar!”