A lifetime on the back roads of California history

Eddy Lane has spent most of his life within a short drive of the ground his stories come from. He grew up in the South Bay and the Santa Cruz Mountains, exploring the creeks, ridges and back roads between the redwoods and the Monterey Bay. He never really left.

His working life took him through Silicon Valley, where he spent a long career building marketing programs for growing technology companies. Along the way he kept finding reasons to do something more interesting on the side. He produced high-end concerts and events with Waterbird Entertainment. He ran Santa Cruz Sidecar Tours, taking passengers on vintage sidecar motorcycles through the orchards and hills of Corralitos and Pleasant Valley. He also became a certified sommelier, which taught him as much about patience and close attention as anything else he has done.

Now retired, he writes full time. The Forgotten Ground series grew out of a habit of stopping at the plaques other people drive past and wondering what they left out. Each story starts in the archives, with county records, coroners’ inquests, ship registries and old newspapers. Where the record goes quiet, he leaves the quiet in.

His novels follow the same instinct into fiction. The Dead Don’t Answer returns to the San Lorenzo Valley in 1885. The Third Fire travels much farther, to Constantinople during the Fourth Crusade.

He lives in Santa Cruz County, California.