Avanti Centrae is an American thriller author best known for her adrenaline-fuelled action novels. She has written the VanOps series and standalone thrillers, including Cleopatra’s Vendetta and The Picasso Job (2025). Centrae has won fourteen literary awards, including the Chanticleer Genre grand prize and the Best Political Thriller award from BestThrillers.com.
Born Kathy Baker in Paulding, Ohio, Centrae graduated from Fremont High School in 1982 as valedictorian. She earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Information Systems with honours from Purdue University in 1986.
She has said, “Even when I was a Silicon Valley IT executive, I used creativity to solve problems at work.” After college, she moved to California and briefly worked as a journalist for a weekly newspaper in Sacramento. In her twenties, she legally changed her name to Avanti Centrae.
For several summers, she worked as a raft guide on the American River and also held positions as a lifeguard, water skier, and backpacker. She later became a Silicon Valley IT executive, a career she left at the age of 53 to pursue writing. Centrae cites her father, a U.S. Marine corporal in Okinawa, as an inspiration.
Centrae’s debut novel, VanOps: The Lost Power (2019), follows twins Maddy Marshall and Will Argones as they pursue a mysterious medieval weapon. The book won a Chanticleer International Book Awards grand prize, an Honourable Mention at the Hollywood Book Festival, and a bronze medal at the Wishing Shelf Book Awards.
It was followed by VanOps: Solstice Shadows (2020), VanOps: The Doomsday Medallion (2022), and Cleopatra’s Vendetta (2022), each receiving awards for political and conspiracy thrillers.
Her most recent book, The Picasso Job (2025), is a standalone crime thriller. It follows Dakota Black, a convicted felon who escapes Folsom State Prison with art thief Renoir Reza. The pair embark on a high-stakes mission to recover a Picasso painting while Special Agent Elizabeth Everett pursues them.
Centrae described the novel as exploring “humanity's struggle for freedom, justice, and redemption.” The Picasso Job was a Fiction Runner-up at the Paris Book Festival and received praise from Publishers Weekly, Chicago Book Review, and FBI art crime expert Robert Wittman.
Avanti Centrae has appeared on NPR, podcasts, and in print media, including Mystery & Suspense Magazine and Newsweek. She is a member of the Authors’ Guild, Sisters in Crime, and International Thriller Writers. Her works have appeared on Amazon and Barnes & Noble bestseller lists in the United States, Canada, and Australia.
Avanti Centrae now lives in Northern California, where she writes and hikes with her family and German shepherds.
Photo credit: www.avanticentrae.com
Born Kathy Baker in Paulding, Ohio, Centrae graduated from Fremont High School in 1982 as valedictorian. She earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Information Systems with honours from Purdue University in 1986.
She has said, “Even when I was a Silicon Valley IT executive, I used creativity to solve problems at work.” After college, she moved to California and briefly worked as a journalist for a weekly newspaper in Sacramento. In her twenties, she legally changed her name to Avanti Centrae.
For several summers, she worked as a raft guide on the American River and also held positions as a lifeguard, water skier, and backpacker. She later became a Silicon Valley IT executive, a career she left at the age of 53 to pursue writing. Centrae cites her father, a U.S. Marine corporal in Okinawa, as an inspiration.
Centrae’s debut novel, VanOps: The Lost Power (2019), follows twins Maddy Marshall and Will Argones as they pursue a mysterious medieval weapon. The book won a Chanticleer International Book Awards grand prize, an Honourable Mention at the Hollywood Book Festival, and a bronze medal at the Wishing Shelf Book Awards.
It was followed by VanOps: Solstice Shadows (2020), VanOps: The Doomsday Medallion (2022), and Cleopatra’s Vendetta (2022), each receiving awards for political and conspiracy thrillers.
Her most recent book, The Picasso Job (2025), is a standalone crime thriller. It follows Dakota Black, a convicted felon who escapes Folsom State Prison with art thief Renoir Reza. The pair embark on a high-stakes mission to recover a Picasso painting while Special Agent Elizabeth Everett pursues them.
Centrae described the novel as exploring “humanity's struggle for freedom, justice, and redemption.” The Picasso Job was a Fiction Runner-up at the Paris Book Festival and received praise from Publishers Weekly, Chicago Book Review, and FBI art crime expert Robert Wittman.
Avanti Centrae has appeared on NPR, podcasts, and in print media, including Mystery & Suspense Magazine and Newsweek. She is a member of the Authors’ Guild, Sisters in Crime, and International Thriller Writers. Her works have appeared on Amazon and Barnes & Noble bestseller lists in the United States, Canada, and Australia.
Avanti Centrae now lives in Northern California, where she writes and hikes with her family and German shepherds.
Photo credit: www.avanticentrae.com
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