The Descent

Thomas Dekker is a Dutch former professional cyclist. As one of the biggest talents in the sport, he catapulted to the top, participating in the Olympics and the Tour de France. His career highlights include winning Tirreno–Adriatico in 2006 and Tour de Romandie in 2007. Yet it all came crashing down when he was caught doping while with the Rabobank team. Dekker was suspended for two years and returned to racing in the summer of 2011 but never got back to his old level. Thijs Zonneveld was a professional cyclist before he became a journalist and writer. He covers cycling for the biggest newspaper in Holland and works as an analyst for Dutch public television. He received the award for the best Dutch sports journalist in 2016 for The Descent.

Alma Katsu is the award-winning author of eleven novels, most recently Fiend, Red London, The Fervor, and Red Widow. Prior to the publication of her first novel, she had a thirty-five-year career as a senior intelligence analyst for several U.S. agencies, including the CIA and NSA, as well as RAND, the global policy think tank. Katsu is a graduate of the masters writing program at the Johns Hopkins University and received her bachelors degree from Brandeis University. She lives outside of Washington, DC, with her husband, where she is a consultant to government and private industry on future trends and analytic methods.