Trivia

American novelist and screenwriter who often wrote as Ed McBain. Also used other pseudonyms such as Curt Cannon, Hunt Collins, and Richard Marsten.

His "87th Precinct" novels--using his "Ed McBain" pseudonym--were the inspiration for the TV series Hill Street Blues (1981), as well as being, more directly, the basis of another series, "87th Precinct", in 1961.

He penned more than 100 novels, plays and film scripts.

Pen name derived from EVANder Childs High School and HUNTER College, both located in New York, both of which he attended. He legally changed his name from Salvatore Lombino to Evan Hunter because he thought Italian writers weren't taken seriously.

A noted exponent of the sub-genre of police procedural drama.

Before becoming a writer, was (among other things) a literary agent who represented P.G. Wodehouse. The two authors became good friends after discovering they shared the same birthday.

Reputedly never planned a book, "just sat down and wrote".

Holder of a 1986 Grand Master Award for Lifetime Achievement from the Mystery Writers of America.

As Ed McBain, he is the only 20th-Century American author to have had his books made into films by Akira Kurosawa and Kon Ichihawa, two of Japan's leading and historically significant directors. "King's Ransom" was the basis for Kurosawa's "Tengoku to Jigoku" (1963) and "Lady, Lady, I Did It!" was the basis for Ichikawa's "Kofuku" (1981).