Suzanne Finstad
| Suzanne Finstad | |
|---|---|
| Born |
Suzanne Elaine Finstad September 14, 1955 Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States |
| Occupation | Author, Biographer, Journalist, Producer, & Lawyer |
| Years active | 1977-present |
Suzanne Finstad (born Suzanne Elaine Finstad September 14, 1955 in Minneapolis, Minnesota) is a bestselling American author, biographer, journalist, producer, and lawyer.
Finstad received the Frank Wardlaw Prize in 1984 for literary excellence for her first book, Heir Not Apparent (1984), drawn from her experiences as a young law clerk and trial attorney investigating claims to the billion-dollar estate of industrialist, aviator and filmmaker Howard Hughes, who appeared to have died without a valid will.American Cinematographer described Heir Not Apparent as a “spellbinding account of intrigues by lawyers, relatives and fortune hunters for a share in the Hughes estate.” Kirkus Reviews praised the book, which was excerpted in Penthouse, as “immediate and engrossing.” Other critics called it “strikingly literate,” “a detective-story lovers dream . . . the stuff good novels are made of.”
Her second book, Ulterior Motives: The Killing and Dark Legacy of Tycoon Henry Kyle (1987), took her into the genre of the non-fiction true crime novel created by Truman Capote’s In Cold Blood, centering on a spectacular murder trial which revealed that self-made millionaire Kyle, shot by his older son, had a violent Jekyll-Hyde personality and a lifetime of secrets, including a hidden wife and daughter.Ulterior Motives, which began as a Rolling Stone assignment into Kyle’s mysterious murder in his rundown Sunset Boulevard mansion, presents a true tale of "money, greed, family discord, drugs and a bigger-than-life cast of characters,” according to the Houston Post. “She handles the story deftly and sensitively,” wrote the book critic for the Dallas Morning News, “with touches of irony and humor.”
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