Mary Ann Fiery was born on December 13, 1934, in Martinsburg, West Virginia.[5] She had an older sister, Cynthia. They were raised in nearby Romney, West Virginia, but moved back to Martinsburg and went to high school there. Mary Ann was an alumna of Miami University in Oxford, Ohio. She married Carl Richard Shaffer in 1956, and in 1958 they moved to California, where they raised two daughters, Morgan and Liz. She worked in the public libraries of San Anselmo, Larkspur,[4] and San Rafael during her career. She also worked as an editor at Harper & Row, and as a bookseller at bookstores in Larkspur and Corte Madera.[4] She began writing The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society in the early 2000s, at the urging of her writing group.[6] She died at her home in San Anselmo, California on February 16, 2008, shortly before the book was published.[6]
References
^Obituary, RememberingCA.US (website), accessed August 5, 2012
^Davies, Stevie (August 8, 2008). "Bright and dark". The Guardian. Retrieved April 24, 2021.