Author. Genealogist. Miniaturist. Speaker. Human.

Deborah Samuel Holman has been digging up family secrets (the genealogical kind, mostly) for over twenty years. What began as a curiosity about her roots quickly became a full-blown passion—and then, inevitably, a teaching gig. An educator by nature, she’s led courses, spoken at conferences, and generally done her best to make genealogy feel less like homework and more like time travel.

She currently serves as Editor of QUEST, the quarterly newsletter of the Jewish Genealogical Society of Connecticut (JGSCT), and moderates the Society’s Writers Group, where she encourages fellow sleuths to turn their research into meaningful stories. She’s also the voice behind the long-running blog Who We Are and How We Got This Way, and the author of several family history books that combine deep research with the occasional raised eyebrow.

Her historical novel Nothing Really Bad Will Happen blends family secrets, emotional grit, and sharp wit—because sometimes the worst stories are the most worth telling. Her children’s book Doris’s New Home introduces younger readers to her mother’s true journey from 1938 Vienna to New York, with warmth, honesty, and just the right number of Linzer cookies.

Her next novel, Countess of Cons: The True Story of a Gilded-Age Grifter, uncovers the bold and slippery life of her husband’s great-grandmother—a con artist who didn’t start scheming until she was fifty, and left behind a trail of aliases, scandals, and secrets. Based on true events, it’s due out soon.

When she’s not writing or wrestling with Canva, she’s bingeing home renovation shows, perfecting tiny furniture in her dollhouse, or wondering if the cushion dent in her couch is permanent now.

A Message from Deb

“You’re going to be a writer some day,” said Mrs. Knox, my fifth-grade teacher. I think she liked me. Sometimes it was hard to tell. She did make me stand me in the closet with gum on my nose because I was chewing in class. To be fair, she did that to anyone caught chewing gum. She always called me “Peanut.” Pretty sure it was a term of endearment, referring to my lack of height, but it didn’t help me fit into the group of “normal-sized” kids.

I wrote a story that year about a Japanese girl and a snake. Sadly, I can’t remember anything else about it. I kept the story, written and illustrated on that weird, little grayish arithmetic paper, for years—until the mice at my mother’s house devoured it.

Mrs. Knox made quite a fuss over my little “book.” She had me read it to the entire class. She told me I was a good writer. No one (other than my mom) had ever told me I was good at anything until then. She even commented on it on my report card! One would think that might have been a turning point for me – that I would take her praise and start writing like crazy. Um. Nope.

It took decades. One marriage, two kids, four grandkids, and two retirements (one from my full-time job teaching at an alternative high school and the other from teaching at Adult Ed) before I fully embraced Mrs. Knox’s prediction.

I AM A WRITER! I hope you enjoy my work.

Learn more about me! Diverse? Eclectic? Quirky? All adjectives I would use to describe myself. Maybe “serial hobbyist?” Hmm… more like …gets bored easily…

Check out my dollhouse miniatures blog at https://dorettecreations.wordpress.com/

and my genealogy-focused blog at https://whoweareandhowwegotthisway.com/