Heilbrun, Carolyn (1926– )

US writer (under the pen-name Amanda Cross) and teacher. She published scholarly works, but is best known as a writer of popular mystery novels featuring Kate Fansler, also an urban college professor, as in A Trap for Fools (1989). Heilbrun was born Carolyn Gold in East Orange, New Jersey. She studied at Wellesley College and Columbia University, gaining her PhD in 1959. She was a visiting lecturer and professor at many institutions, and taught English at Brooklyn College (1959–60) and Columbia (1960–93).