Hana Samek Norton was born and raised in the former Czechoslovakia and lived in Canada before moving to New Mexico where she earned a Ph.D. in history from the University of New Mexico. She currently lives in the Land of Enchantment,  is  married to an Englishman, works as a consultant, and occasionally teaches. She is the author of The Sixth Surrender (Penguin-Plume 2010), a historical novel of medieval France. The Serpent’s Crown, set in France, the Holy Land, and Cyprus is its sequel