Ridley Pearson's novels cover a lot of ground: from paranormals to Peter Pan. With an emphasis on entertaining the reader and delivering screw-tightening suspense, both his crime fiction and his young-reader novels have earned him a reputation for detailed research and hair-raising story lines.

Now a New York Times bestselling author, Ridley began his professional career as a singer/songwriter in an acoustic rock band and spent over a decade on the road playing gigs between clubs and colleges. He turned to screenwriting, writing for eight and half years without being produced or published, eventually finding his way to writing novels. Helped by a retired agent, he learned the craft of the rewrite, and published a much re-written, Never Look Back, in 1985. His 23rd published novel hit the shelves in July 2006.

A founding member of The Rockbottom Remainders, an all-author '60s rock and roll band now featuring Amy Tan, Dave Barry, Mitch Albom, Scott Turow, Greg Isles, and Roy Blount, Jr. (with cameos by Stephen King), Ridley has kept his ties to music. It was in the band that Ridley and Dave Barry became friends and went on to collaborate on a series of novels that explain the beginnings of Peter Pan. Peter and the Starcatchers (Disney Books, 2004) spent 47 weeks on the NYTimes Children's Bestseller List. Peter and The Shadow Thieves is to be published in July 2006.

He has continued to work in television and film, and occasionally has something to show for it: a documentary written for A&E on Alcoholics Anonymous was aired in 2003; The Diary Of Ellen Rimbauer, a two hour movie of the week was aired by ABC in 2004. He is presently at work developing a possible television series for Equinoxe Films with producer Judith James and co-creator, Kitty McCue. Disney Animated Features has optioned Peter and the Starcatchers, for both film and stage productions.

The Kingdom Keepers, a Young Adult novel about five kids inside Disney World after dark drew the most fan mail of any novel he's written and may be the start of a new series.

Ridley is currently writing a crime series for Putnam/Penguin for editor Dan Conaway. The first of the series, Killer Weekend, is scheduled for February, 2007. Although there are none of Ridley's Lou Boldt novels presently in production, he claims the (nine book) series remains very much alive.

Ridley lives with his wife, Marcelle, and their two young daughters dividing their time between St. Louis, MO and Hailey, Idaho.

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