Physicist. Operations research analyst. Space scientist. Crime novelist. Elizabeth Heider doesn't have a career path — she has a pursuit.

She holds a doctorate in physics from Tufts. She has worked with the US Navy, INTERPOL, Northrop Grumman, NASA, and the European Space Agency. She has operated alongside military personnel across Army, Navy, Marines, and Special Forces.

And then, in 2024, she published May the Wolf Die — a crime novel set in Naples that the New York Times named one of the Best Crime Novels of 2024, the Washington Post named one of the Best Mystery Novels of 2024, and Publishers Weekly starred and named one of its Best Books of 2024. The sequel, Children of the Savage City, followed in February 2026 to immediate critical acclaim.

Her protagonist, Nikki Serafino, asks a question that sits at th ...