Susan Lynn Peterson Ph.D., has made a career of writing about complex topics in a straightforward entertaining way. Building on a lifetime of interest in health, especially alternative healing practices, she has spent three years and thousands of hours investigating the way herbs have been used in various cultures to treat injuries. A Martial Artist's Guide to Western Herbs is her fifth book. Her first three books, published by Tuttle Publishing and Zondervan Publishing House, a subsidiary of Harper Collins, have been translated into five languages. For the first book, she earned a Gold Medallion Book award nomination. She has also contributed to several national magazines including Black Belt, New Body, Complete Woman, and Fighting Woman News.

Peterson has been a martial artist for more than twenty years. She holds a fifth-degree black belt in Okinawan Shuri-ryu karate, a second-degree black belt in traditional Okinawan weapons, and has also studied Yang-style Tai Chi Chuan and Martial Kinesiology, a hands-on system of mind-body healing for several years. Her other martial arts experience includes Kenpo, Wing Chun, Aikido, Taekwondo, Jujitsu, Seven Star Qigong, and Shaolin Chuan Fa.

She was a 1995 USA Karate Federation (USAKF) national gold medalist in kobudo (traditional weapons), a USAKF Arizona gold medalist in advanced kata and kobudo, and a 2001 USAKF Pacific League Tournament gold medalist in advanced kata and kobudo, and in 2006 placed fourth in the United States Karate Masters' Division.

Susan Lynn Peterson holds an MA in Linguistics and a Ph.D. in the Humanities, Text Theory. When she is not writing, she teaches karate at KoSho Pantano and runs Alcuin Communications, an Internet and print media communications company. She resides with her family in Tucson, Arizona.