A native of Iredell County, Kent Westmoreland grew up on a local farm and graduated from South Iredell High School. After high school, he lived and worked in Charlotte and later attended college and became a software developer. Currently Westmoreland and his wife Leslie and their three cats live in uptown New Orleans. He is a project manager for a bank. His award-winning Burleigh Drummond short stories have appeared in the magazines Blue Murder, Tangled Web, Thrilling Detective, and Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine. His first novel Baronne Street, a Burleigh Drummond mystery, was published in September 2010. Westmoreland states, "People sometimes ask me why I write and why I created the Burleigh Drummond universe.  [My wife] Leslie tells me I like to pontificate and she’s correct.  The format and structure of the detective novel provides the freedom to opine on the human condition in relation to social and political issues.  And it is fun."