Jassy Mackenzie

Jassy Mackenzie is from a family where books weren’t just more important than television, they were so important that television was banned from the house.Jassy is the second youngest of five sisters. She was born in Zimbabwe, and moved to South Africa when she was eight years old. Today, she is the editor of HJ, a hair and beauty magazine. She lives on a smallholding outside Johannesburg and shares her life with her wonderful partner Dion, two horses and two cats. Her first novel, Random Violence, featuring the feisty P.I. Jade de Jong, was published by Umuzi in South Africa in 2008 and shortlisted for Best First Book in the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize, Africa region. It was published by Soho Press in the USA, where it was nominated for a Shamus Award in the Best First Book category and received a starred review from Publishers Weekly and Library Journal.Her second book, a standalone thriller called My Brother’s Keeper, was published in 2009 and shortlisted for Best First Novel – Paperback Original in the International Thriller Awards. The next book in the Jade de Jong series, Stolen Lives, was published in 2010 (in the USA in 2011). This was followed by Worst Case in 2011 (titled The Fallen in the USA). Stolen Lives received a starred review from Library Journal, and The Fallen received a starred review from Publishers Weekly.The latest in the Jade de Jong series, Pale Horses, has been published in South Africa in 2012 and will launch in the USA in April 2013.Jassy has also written a humorous erotic novel, Folly, which has just been launched in South Africa. She is now hard at work on the next Jade book.