John Owens was born in Liverpool, England in 1953 and journeyed to Canada at the age of two (apparently with some assistance). Raised and schooled in Ottawa, he obtained a BA in English Literature from Trent University followed by an MA from Queen’s. After a teaching stint in the Bahamas, he returned to Ottawa where he began a 32-year career in marketing and public relations with, successively, a charity, a technology company, the Ottawa Senators hockey team, and, since 1996, with his own marketing and communications business.

Owens kicked off the comic Jake Lydon mystery series with Connecdead, followed up by Machete and Bushwhacked.

The fourth novel in the series, Jackpot, is oh so close to completion.

He is also the author of two novels of historical fiction — On the Rails and The Sixth String — and more than 30 short stories. He is married to long-suffering and saintly Maggie. They live in Morrisburg, Ontario on the banks of the St. Lawrence River and in Indian Rocks Beach, Florida on — wait for it — the banks of the Gulf of Mexico.