ZETTLER, Steve 1947-

(Nero Blanc, a joint pseudonym)

PERSONAL:

Born December 21, 1947, in Bucks County, PA; married Cordelia Frances Biddle, August 13, 1988. Education: Attended Clemson University. Religion: "Episcopalian."

ADDRESSES:

Home and office—P.O. Box 63625, Philadelphia, PA 19147. Agent—Alice Martell, 545 Madison Ave., New York, NY 10022. E-mail—neroblanc@crosswordmysteries.com.

CAREER:

Writer, photographer, and actor. Has appeared on stage in more than twenty-five productions, including A Soldier's Play, and has appeared on many daytime and prime-time television shows, including Columbo, Falcon Crest, Divorce Court, and One Life to Live. Military service: United States Marine Corps; served in Vietnam.

AWARDS, HONORS:

Barrymore Award nomination, 1997, for role in Bare Knuckle.

WRITINGS:

THRILLERS

The Second Man, Dutton/Onyx (New York, NY), 1996.

Double Identity, Dutton/Onyx (New York, NY), 1997.

Ronin, Hachette Livre (Paris, France), 1998.

"CROSSWORD MYSTERY" SERIES; WITH WIFE, CORDELIA FRANCES BIDDLE, UNDER JOINT PSEUDONYM NERO BLANC

The Crossword Murder, Berkley Prime Crime (New York, NY), 1999.

Two Down: A Crossword Murder Mystery, Berkley Prime Crime (New York, NY), 2000.

The Crossword Connection, Berkley Prime Crime (New York, NY), 2001.

A Crossword to Die For, Berkley Prime Crime (New York, NY), 2002.

A Crossworder's Holiday (short stories), Berkley Prime Crime (New York, NY), 2002.

Corpus de Crossword, Berkley Prime Crime (New York, NY), 2003.

A Crossworder's Gift, Berkley Prime Crime (New York, NY), 2003.

Wrapped up in Crosswords, Berkley Prime Crime (New York, NY), 2004.

Anatomy of a Crossword, Berkley Prime Crime (New York, NY), 2004.

Contributor of short stories to Hemispheres.

WORK IN PROGRESS:

Piece of Cake, a caper, and an untitled screenplay.

SIDELIGHTS:

Husband-and-wife writing team Steve Zettler and Cordelia Frances Biddle are authors of the "Crossword Mystery" series of mystery novels, which they publish under the pseudonym Nero Blanc. The books offer mystery stories directly linked to crossword puzzles and clues found in the puzzle solutions. Copies of the puzzles are included in the books, allowing astute readers the chance to solve them and gather clues along with the protagonists, crossword editor Annabella (Belle) Graham and Greek-American private investigator and ex-cop Rosco Polycrates.

The authors, stage and television actors, met while working on the stage in New York. Writing together, Biddle related in an interview with Cathy Sowa on the Mystery Reader Web site, seemed the next logical progression. "While living and working together in New York, our fondest stage memories have always been those of the productions where we appeared together," she told Sowa. "As we both segued into writing careers, the lure of becoming coauthors was one that we found impossible to resist."

In addition to their joint work as Nero Blanc, both Zettler and Biddle have written works on their own and under their own names. Biddle wrote the historical drama Beneath the Wind and coauthored Murder at San Simeon with newspaper heiress Patricia Hearst. She is also the coauthor of the nonfiction book Caring for Your Cherished Possessions, written with Mary Kearney Levenstein.

Zettler has three international thrillers to his solo credit: The Second Man, Double Identity, and Ronin. In Double Identity, burned-out cop and ex-Secret Service agent Joe Bradlee is recruited as the decoy double of Billy Barton, and secreted in the witness protection program in Paris. Joe meets Andie on a plane flight, and they have a passionate fling, until Joe's roving eye alights on his Paris contact, Danielle. Andie decides to extract a little well-deserved revenge, just as undesirables find out Joe's address—and they come looking for Billy, finding Joe instead. Zettler "has a comic bite and a breezy style," and the book contains "enough hard edged-tension for hard-core thriller fans," commented a reviewer in Publishers Weekly.

Maintaining their individual writing projects is important to the couple, as Zettler explained to Sova. "As much as we like working together, nothing can replace the experience of creating a work of fiction on a solo basis. We each have our own voice, and once we finish with our coauthoring, we seem inspired to jump into our own work with a new vengeance."

In The Crossword Murder, the first Nero Blanc book, Thomas C. Briephs, the crossword puzzle editor for the Newcastle, Massachusetts, Herald, has been found dead in his bed, apparently the victim of heart failure. Though the police rule his death accidental, Briephs's mother insists the fifty-one-year-old man was in perfect health. She hires investigator Rosco Polycrates to look into the situation. For background information on crossword puzzles, Polycrates goes to Annabella Graham, crossword editor at the Herald's rival newspaper, Evening Crier. Not only does Belle provide him with plenty of crossword information, she also joins him on the case. The wealthy, unmarried Briephs's sexual antics made him an easy target for blackmail, and for the previous year he had been submitting to demands for regular cash payments. And it was after a meeting with his blackmailer that he was found dead. When some of Briephs's final crosswords are published, Belle surmises that they contain clues to his murder. An attack on Briephs's secretary JaneAlice, and the theft of three of Briephs's unpublished puzzles, complicates matters.

A Kirkus Reviews critic noted that Blanc "present[s] a likable if a bit too passive detective" in the book. "The Crossword Murder is an inventive, unique novel that shows there are still many creative ways to distribute clues to readers," commented Harriet Klausner on Bookbrowser.com. Blanc "delivers an enjoyable, complex solution and likable protagonists who are strong enough to carry the series forward," remarked a reviewer in Publishers Weekly.

When banker Tom Pepper's wife, Genie, and her soap-opera actress friend Jamaica Nevisson disappear while at sea in Two Down, the reliable Rosco Polycrates is called in to investigate. Fisherman recover Genie's rented sailboat, charred by fire, and Pepper believes that negligence by the boat rental agent led to his wife's presumed death. Belle begins to receive crossword puzzles that, when solved, contain what she thinks are clues to the women's disappearance. Then Rosco discovers the missing women's inflatable life raft on a lonely beach, gashed beyond repair. As they search for clues in the case, Rosco and Belle find romance sparking between them, which makes Rosco even more concerned when Belle receives new crosswords containing not-so-subtle threats. "Readers who enjoy a different type of who-done-it … will fully relish Mr. Blanc's latest across and down novel," Klausner commented in her Bookbrowswer.com review.

Belle and Rosco's wedding day is quickly approaching in The Crossword Connection, but the murder of a homeless man in Newcastle delays their nuptials. Suspicions arise that the murder might be part of a plan to close down a homeless shelter so that developers can exploit the location for profit. Socialite Sara Crane Briephs enlists Rosco's aid to find a puppy recently adopted by the murdered man, and after a second murder Rosco disappears, apparently kidnapped. Once again, ominous, threatening crossword puzzles arrive in Belle's hands, puzzles she thinks are coming from Rosco's kidnapper. An increasingly desperate Belle turns to Al Lever, Rosco's former partner on the police force, to find the missing detective. "Blanc builds the suspense slowly and surely, challenging the reader with a dandy puzzler," remarked a Publishers Weekly reviewer.

Belle goes Hollywood in Anatomy of a Crossword after agreeing to put together puzzles for a television movie based on one of her cases. When she arrives on the set, murders occur—first the movie's writer, then other important crewmembers. The solution to the murders demands that Belle solve a series of devious crosswords—and, as in the previous books in the series, they are included in the book to test readers' skills. Ilene Cooper, writing in Booklist, declared that "this is a delight for both amateur sleuths and crossword-puzzle aficionados."

The authors told CA: "If you want to test your marriage—sit down and write a little fiction together. We're happy to say, that after six books—all is well!!"

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Booklist, July, 2004, Ilene Cooper, review of Anatomy of a Crossword, p. 1823.

Kirkus Reviews, August 1, 1999, review of The Crossword Murder, p. 1173; June 15, 2002, review of A Crossword to Die For, p. 839; September 1, 2002, review of A Crossworder's Holiday, p. 1266.

Library Journal, October 1, 2003, Rex Klett, review of A Crossworder's Gift, p. 121.

Publishers Weekly, November 24, 1997, Maria Simson, review of Double Identity, p. 71; July 12, 1999, review of The Crossword Murder, p. 79; June 12, 2000, review of Two Down: A Crossword Murder Mystery, p. 56; June 11, 2001, review of The Crossword Connection, p. 64; June 3, 2002, review of A Crossword to Die For, p. 69; June 2, 2003, review of Corpus de Crossword, p. 37; June 28, 2004, review of Anatomy of a Crossword, p. 35.

Weekly Standard, December 23, 2002, Jon L. Breen, review of A Crossworder's Holiday, p. 37.

ONLINE

Bookbrowser.com,http://www.bookbrowser.com/ (September 1, 2004), Harriet Klausner, reviews of Two Down: A Crossword Murder Mystery and The Crossword Murder.

CrosswordMysteries.com,http://www.crosswordmysteries.com/ (September 1, 2004).

Mystery Reader Web site, http://www.themysteryreader.com/ (September 1, 2004), Cathy Sova, "Meet Nero Blanc."

Suite101.com,http://www.suite101.com/ (September 1, 2004), Janet Kay Blaylock, review of The Crossword Murder.