Dr. Lois Leveen holds degrees in history and literature from Harvard University, the University of Southern California, and the University of California, Los Angeles. She is the author of two novels: Juliet’s Nurse (Simon & Schuster, 2014), which imagines the fourteen years leading up to the events in Romeo and Juliet, and The Secrets of Mary Bowser (HarperCollins, 2012), which was inspired by rumors of an African American woman who played a key role in the pro-Union spy ring that operated in the Confederate capital during the Civil War. In a truth-is-stranger-than-fiction twist, Dr. Leveen is now researching and writing a non-fiction biography of Mary Richards Denman, the real figure behind the Bowser myth. In addition to her Civil War achievements, Mary Richards Denman advocated for women’s rights and racial justice throughout Reconstruction, working both during and after the war with networks of black activists and their white allies.