The Fifth Estate

A late night knock sends writer SEBASTIAN WREN mentally back 30-some years because the woman at the door resembles his former lover, MORGAN O’CONNOR. It is Morgan’s born-out-of-wedlock daughter CHELSEA. She came to solicit Sebastian’s help to get back her kidnapped mother. Sebastian realizes Chelsea could not be his daughter, but the twin mysteries of her parentage and her mother’s abduction, along with a scant clue on a cell phone, send the pair to L.A. The couple trek north only to face kidnappers that manage to pull a switch; Morgan is free, but Chelsea becomes captive, and a plot more sinister than kidnapping and simple ransom is finally revealed.

Author Biography

Steven R. Berger worked as the advertising director of, respectively, a chain of record stores, a home builder and a national real estate franchise before turning freelance and writing advertising and marketing propaganda. He taught copy writing, had a featured column in The Denver Post and was published in several regional and national magazines before turning his talents to writing novels. Steven R. Berger is a member and past president of the Colorado Authors’ League. Currently, he has three more books in process, Innocent Bystander, Ursula’s Yahrtzeit and a new Sebastian Wren mystery. Born and raised in Los Angeles, Berger earned a degree in English, and collected five incomplete minors, from California State University at Northridge. He worked his way through college in record stores and continued in the business in L.A., San Francisco, Denver and Atlanta, working his way up through management to become the advertising director for a chain of 16 stores in 10 markets, before moving from Atlanta to Denver and applying his experience to first a new home builder and then a real estate company. As a freelancer, Berger continued to do work for new home builders providing copy for ads and collateral marketing materials. He also wrote a weekly column for the Denver Post on a variety of subjects that focused on homebuilding, home ownership and maintenance, real estate issues, etc. In addition he wrote articles for magazines as diverse as Colorado Expressions, Colorado Homes & Lifestyle, The Museum Store Association Magazine and Writer’s Digest. Berger lives with his wife and two cats in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains outside Denver. His interests include cooking, hiking, traveling and politics.