About Michael Scott Bertrand
Michael Scott Bertrand was born in Virginia and raised in Vermont. He attended Montpelier public schools, Penn State University and Fordham Law School. He lives in Boca Raton, Florida.
Much like Oliver Wheelock, the scrappy narrator of Flying Conquistadors, Bertrand has worked in a variety of jobs and done a little bit of everything. As a young lawyer he served as a clerk in the Vermont House of Representatives, and after an unsuccessful bid for public office he was recruited to become Vermont’s Commissioner of Labor and Industry. He would go on to serve in several high-ranking positions in Vermont state government, ending his public service as the state’s Commissioner of Banking and Insurance. His background also includes three glorious seasons as an administrator for minor league baseball teams in Texas and Minnesota, serving as legal counsel to a Vermont ski resort, and several years as a consultant on regulatory matters.
But the urge to write had long been gnawing at Bertrand’s ropes, and he longed for the opportunity to combine his two favorite types of books—classic American literature and old-school adventure stories—into a new breed of adventure fiction. One day he came upon a book of illustrations by Frederick Catherwood, an 18th-century artist and architect who explored Central America and the Yucatan with writer and diplomat John Lloyd Stephens. Catherwood’s mesmerizing, detailed drawings of ancient Mayan ruins buried deep in the jungles lit a fire in Bertrand, and the Treasure of Tenochtitlan trilogy was born.