BRIAN GARFIELD

According to the fascinating bio on his website: "The writer was born in 1939. His first published book was written when he was 18. He grew up in Arizona, earned a Master’s Degree from the University of Arizona, and has lived in various parts of Europe and America. He has published about seventy books, several of them nominated for (or winners of) awards, and numerous short pieces. He is best known for his novels of suspense and the movies derived from them, including "Hopscotch", "Death Wish", "Relentless", "Necessity" and "Death Sentence;" and the original movie "The Stepfather".

More than 20 million copies of his books have been published worldwide. He is an Army veteran and a past-President of the Western Writers of America and of the Mystery Writers of America (the only writer to have served in both offices).

Nineteen films are based on his writings, and more are in the hopper for 2011 and beyond -- "The Fabulist", based on Garfield's recent biography "The Meinertzhagen Mystery" (Garfield is one of its producers); "Death Wish", an MGM remake written and directed by Sylvester Stallone; an updated remake of "Hopscotch" (Garfield is one of the executive producers); an as yet untitled Baldwin Entertainment Group film based on Garfield's novel "Manifest Destiny"; others as well.

The Hyde Park /? Baldwin Entertainment Group production “Death Sentence”, with Kevin Bacon, Kelly Preston, John Goodman and Aisha Tyler, based on Garfield’s novel and directed by James Wan, was released by 20th Century Fox in September 2007. It is available now on DVD, as are DVDs of most of his films including the recent (fall 2009) releases of the (earlier) original "The Stepfather" 1987 and "Stepfather II".

In the 1950s Brian Garfield toured as an itinerant musician with “The Palisades”, a jazz-rock-blues band that had a top-40 hit with “I Can’t Quit” (Calico Records) - they appeared on “American Bandstand” and other programs.

Having performed as jazz, blues, and rock-&-roll artist, and having written and/?or produced Westerns, mysteries, hard-boiled crime novels, spy stories, and a musical comedy movie (“Legs”, about the Rockettes, co-produced by Radio City Music Hall), he claims to have worked in nearly all the original Anglo-American popular arts. Inevitably his publishers’ frequent complaint has been that he and his work cannot be type-cast. (His excuse: "If the writer ever gets bored, Heaven help the reader.")"