Born in Brooklyn on June 18, 1889, Elisabeth Sanxay knew she wanted to be a writer by the time she was six. At sixteen she completed her first story. She published the first of several contemporary novels in 1920 but turned to mysteries when the Depression changed the market. Self-taught as a writer, she developed her style by translating English into other languages, then translating other languages into English. Holding published 25 novels in her lifetime — 18 of them mysteries — and a wide variety of short stories. She married British diplomat George E. Holding in 1913 and together with their two daughters they traveled widely in South America and the Caribbean before settling in Bermuda for a number of years. She died in the Bronx section of New York City on February 7, 1955.