As one of the prominent areas of genre fiction, the thriller simultaneously engages, educates and scares its readers. Those who write within the genre need to be capable of skilled craftsmanship and, as Lindsay Parnell argues, few contemporaries writers have captured the suspense and dark atmosphere of the true thriller like the Jewish American author Richard Zimler.

Richard Zimler completed his Bachelor’s Degree in comparative religion at Duke University before receiving his Masters in journalism from Stanford. Subsequently, Zimler taught journalism at a collegiate level for nearly twenty years in both the US and Portugal - where he has been a citizen since 2002. Known for his narrative fusions of Jewish spirituality and historical noir thrillers, Zimler’s body of work consists of eight critically acclaimed novels that have received international recognition from Brazil, Australia, the United Kingdom, the United States and Portugal among others. Zimler’s literary preoccupation with the heroic search for spirituality during devastating religious and political conflicts has proven to transcend linguistic and geographic boundaries. His collection of novels are intriguing tales of personal and public history in the midst of violent turmoil, especially his three most notable texts The Last Kabbalist of Lisbon, The Warsaw Anagrams and Guardian of the Dawn.