Portrait taken by Ivan Gimenez Costa, courtesy of the Simon & Schuster, publisher.
John Connolly
, b. 1968
An Irish writer specialized in crime, horror, and supernatural fiction, he holds a B.A. in English, obtained at Trinity College in Dublin, and an M.A. in journalism from Dublin City University. Before starting his writing career, he worked as a journalist, a bartender, a local government official, a waiter, and – as stated on his official website – “a dogsbody at Harrods department store in London.” He is probably best known for his multivolume supernatural crime series of novels about an anti-heroic former policeman, Charlie Parker (the first book in the cycle, Every Dead Thing, published in 1999; the latest one, The Woman in the Woods, in 2018). He also wrote a fantasy/horror trilogy for younger readers about Samuel Johnson’s adventures (2009–2013), a cycle of young adult fantasy books The Chronicles of the Invaders (2013–2016), co-created with Jennifer Ridyard, as well as standalone novels: Bad Men (2003), The Book of Lost Things (2006), He (2017; a fictional biography of Stan Laurel), and stories and novellas, some of which were published in collections: Nocturnes (2004) and Night Music: Nocturnes Vol. 2 (2015). For his works, he received numerous prizes, such as the “Shamus Award,” the “Barry Award,” the “Agatha Award,” the “Antony Award,” the “Edgar Allan Poe Award,” and the “Alex Award.” He lives between Dublin and Portland, Maine. He is a wine connaisseur and an admirer of dogs.
Sources:
Official website (accessed: July 4, 2018).
About John, available at www.johnconnollybooks.com (accessed: July4, 2018).
Bernard A. Drew, “John Connolly”, in idem, 100 Most Popular Contemporary Mystery Authors: Biographical Sketches and Bibliographies, Santa Barbara, Denver, Oxford: Libraries Unlimited, 86–88.
Bio prepared by Maciej Skowera, University of Warsaw, mgskowera@gmail.com
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