Sara Paretsky (born June 8, 1947) is an American author of detective fiction, best known for her novels focused on the female protagonist V.I. Warshawski.

Life and career

Paretsky was born in Ames, Iowa. Her father was a microbiologist and moved the family to Kansas in 1951 after taking a job at the University of Kansas, where Paretsky eventually graduated. Being Jewish, the family was limited in where they could live due to segregated zoning laws at the time, and they ended up renting an old farm house. Her relationship with her parents was strained; her mother was an alcoholic and her father was a harsh disciplinarian.

After obtaining a Bachelor's degree in political science from the University of Kansas, she did community service work on the south side of Chicago in 1966 and returned in 1968 to work there. She ultimately completed a Ph.D. in history at the University of Chicago; her dissertation was entitled "The Breakdown of Moral Philosophy in New England Before the Civil War". She also earned an MBA from the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business.