Frank Heller has published biographical and exhibition catalogs on American and European artists, some of which are housed in the Smithsonian Institution Libraries in Washington, D.C. He was a hospital corpsman in the US Navy during the early years of the Vietnam War.

To write The Secret Empress, he drew on his thirty years of experience working in and traveling to China in the import business. Mr. Heller resides in Beverly Hills, where he is hard at work on his next thriller.