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William Martin is the author of eight novels, an award-winning PBS documentary, and a horror movie that's now considered a cult classic. He is best known, however, for his historical novels, which have chronicled the history of Boston, New England, and the nation. His first novel, Back Bay (1980) spent fourteen weeks on the New York Times Best Seller List.

His subsequent work has established him, in the words of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, as a "master story-teller." There are now close to three million copies of his books in print. At the publication of Annapolis, a saga about the U.S. Navy, Publisher's Weekly called him "the maritime Michener." Of his biographical novel, Citizen Washington, USA Today wrote, "Martin brings the myth down to earth without destroying the man... Deft, spicy, and excitingly readable... This fiction is so complex in its understanding of humanity as to seem actually true."

But in his most popular works, he has joined the historical novel and the mystery-thriller to create a genre all its own. In Back Bay, Cape Cod, Harvard Yard, and now, The Lost Constitution, his characters track the passage of priceless artifacts through history while,in alternating chapters,the history comes to life. He explores the links we have to the past - to the decisions of distant ancestors, to the evolution of the physical world,to the grand movements of history itself.

But his first goal is to keep readers turning pages. He says, "This is a story. It's supposed to be fun..." And he has told his tale so well that The New England Booksellers Association gave him their 2005 New England Book Award for Fiction. It goes annually to to an author whose "body of work stands as a significant contribution to the region's literature."