Jessica Mann

Jessica Mann (13 September 1937 – 10 July 2018) was a British writer and novelist. She also wrote several non-fiction books, including Out of Harm's Way, an account of the overseas evacuation of children from Britain in World War II.

Born in London, Mann was educated at St Paul's Girls' School and Newnham College, Cambridge, where she read Archaeology and Anglo-Saxon Studies, graduating in 1959. and the University of Leicester, from which she had a degree in Law. She wrote features, comment and reviews for the Literary Review magazine, The Daily Telegraph, The Sunday Telegraph, Western Morning News, House & Garden and other publications. She appeared on television programmes such as Question Time and represented the South West on radio's Round Britain Quiz. As a novelist, she specialised in the mystery and suspense genres; her 22 novels were published from 1971 to 2016.

Mann lived near Truro in Cornwall and was married to the archaeologist and historian Charles Thomas until he died in 2016. The couple married a week after Mann completed her Cambridge finals in 1959, and had two sons and two daughters.