Conrad Jestmore's writing influences run the gamut from Shakespeare to Hemingway, from Robert Frost to Seamus Heaney. He has published short stories, poetry and non-fiction in numerous journals and anthologies, and now offers his Jimmy O'Reilly Murder Mystery series. He has, over the years, earned gainful employment as a welfare case worker in the mountains of northern California, an elevator operator when elevators still had them, a bartender, a paint warehouse stocker, a USO performer and a high school teacher. He is a Past President of Kansas Writers Association. He is a Reiki Master, and currently teaches Reiki classes and heals both humans and animals in his central Kansas Reiki practice.

Numerous awards in fiction, non-fiction,plays and poetry from Kansas Writers Association, Kansas Authors Club, and the Poetry Society of Oklahoma.