Stephen Hawley Martin

In college, Stephen Hawley Martin was editor-in-chief of the yearbook, an all-conference center on the varsity football team, cartoonist for the college newspaper and rush chairman of his fraternity.

After graduation, he went to work for an advertising agency and in just 18 months was handling that firm’s largest account, USAirways.

Six years later he went into business with his brother, David, and The Martin Agency was formed. Named the USA’s top advertising agency in January 2010 by ADWEEK, the firm now boasts such clients as GEICO (gecko and caveman), Pizza Hut, and Wal-Mart.

Martin’s first love, however, is books. His initial effort, a thriller entitled The Search for Nina Fletcher, was published in 1993. His latest, Dead Man of the Year, is a whodunit scheduled for release on July 1, 2010. An entrepreneur as well as an author and editor, Martin founded The Oaklea Press in 1995 and now devotes his full energy to writing and editing. He has written a dozen books under his own name and has ghostwritten or edited two dozen more.

Several titles by Martin have won top book industry awards. He is the only three-time winner of the Writer’s Digest Book Award, having won for both nonfiction and fiction, and he has won a first prize for fiction from Independent Publisher, and a first prize for nonfiction from USA Book News.

Martin has three school age children and lives in central Virginia with them and his wife of twenty years. He is listed in Who’s Who in the Media and Communications and in Who’s Who Worldwide.