Grow­ing up a con­cert pianist in Sovi­et Rus­sia, Riv­er Adams (they/​them) came to Amer­i­ca as a Jew­ish refugee dur­ing the col­lapse of the USSR and began their life from scratch in their adopt­ed home­land. Before earn­ing an MFA in cre­ative writ­ing from Emer­son Col­lege, they grad­u­at­ed from the Delaware Coun­ty Com­mu­ni­ty Col­lege, Rose­mont Col­lege, earned an MTS degree from Har­vard Divin­i­ty School, then returned to Penn­syl­va­nia to teach world reli­gions to col­lege stu­dents at their alma maters. At the same time, they worked as a cer­ti­fied med­ical inter­preter for Russ­ian-speak­ing patients at Philadel­phia hos­pi­tals. Over the past 30 years, they have trav­eled to and lived in 30 states, falling in love with each. Today, Riv­er lives in Mass­a­chu­setts, writ­ing and tak­ing care of a big, noisy fam­i­ly of six humans, two dogs, and a demon dis­guised as a cat. They are the author of many pub­lished short sto­ries, essays, and a biog­ra­phy of Leonard Swi­dler, There Must Be YOU (2014). The Light of Sev­en Days is their debut novel.