Lee Child
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Lee Child | |||
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![]() Lee Child at Bouchercon XLI, 2010
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Born | Jim Grant 29 October 1954 Coventry, England, UK |
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Occupation | Novelist, writer, author | ||
Nationality | British | ||
Period | 1985–present | ||
Genre | Crime fiction, mystery, thriller | ||
Notable works | Jack Reacher series of novels | ||
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Website | |||
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Jim Grant (born 29 October 1954), better known by his pen name Lee Child, is a British thriller writer.[1] His first novel, Killing Floor, won the Anthony Award for Best First Novel.
Each of Child's novels follows the adventures of a former American military policeman, Jack Reacher, who wanders the United States.
Contents
Early life
Jim Grant was born in Coventry, England.[2] His father was a civil servant[3] and his younger brother, Andrew Grant, is also a thriller novelist.[citation needed] Grant's parents moved him and his three brothers to Handsworth Wood in Birmingham when he was four years old, so that the boys could get a better education.[4] Grant attended Cherry Orchard Primary School in Handsworth Wood until the age of 11. He attended King Edward's School, Birmingham.[5]
In 1974, at age 20, Grant studied law at University of Sheffield, though he had no intention of entering the legal profession and, during his student days, worked backstage in a theatre.[3] After graduating, he worked in commercial television.[6]
Career
Television production career
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Grant joined Granada Television, part of the UK's ITV Network, in Manchester as a presentation director.[7] There he was involved with shows including Brideshead Revisited, The Jewel in the Crown, Prime Suspect, and Cracker. Grant was involved in the transmission of more than 40,000 hours of programming for Granada, writing thousands of commercials and news stories.[8] He worked at Granada from 1977 to 1995[3] and ended his career there with two years as a trade union shop steward.[9]
Writing career
After being made redundant from his job due to corporate restructuring,[7] Grant decided to start writing novels, stating they are "the purest form of entertainment."[10] In 1997, his first novel, Killing Floor, was published, and he moved to the United States in the summer of 1998.[11]
His pen name "Lee" comes from a family joke about mispronunciation of the name of Renault's Le Car, with "Child" indicating where Grant would place his work on bookstore shelves, i.e., between crime fiction stars Raymond Chandler and Agatha Christie.[7]
Grant has said that he chose the name Reacher for the central character in his novels because he himself is tall and, in a supermarket (Asda in Kendal, Cumbria, when he was living in Kirkby Lonsdale), his wife Jane told him: "'Hey, if this writing thing doesn't pan out, you could always be a reacher in a supermarket.' ... 'I thought, Reacher — good name.'"[3] Some books in the Reacher series are written in first person, while others are written in the third person. Grant has characterised the books as revenge stories – "Somebody does a very bad thing, and Reacher takes revenge" – driven by his anger at the downsizing at Granada. Although English, he deliberately chose to write American-style thrillers.[7]
In 2007, Grant collaborated with 14 other writers to create the 17-part serial thriller The Chopin Manuscript, narrated by Alfred Molina. This was broadcast weekly on Audible.com between 25 September 2007 and 13 November 2007.
On 30 June 2008, it was announced that Grant would be taking up a Visiting Professorship at the University of Sheffield from November 2008. In 2009, Grant funded 52 Jack Reacher scholarships for students at the university.[12]
Grant was elected president of the Mystery Writers of America in 2009.[13]
In 2012, his novel One Shot was adapted into Jack Reacher; an American thriller film starring Tom Cruise. Grant has a cameo appearance as a police desk sergeant in the film.
Writing style
Grant's prose has been described as "hardboiled" and "commercial" in style. A 2012 interview suggested that many aspects of the Jack Reacher novels were deliberately aimed at maintaining the books' profitability, rather than for literary reasons. For instance, making Jack Reacher have one parent who was French was suggested as being partly because the presence of only American members of Reacher's family would limit the series' appeal in France. The same interview stated that Grant "didn't apologise about the commercial nature" of his fiction.[14]
Philanthropy
In January 2012, Grant donated £10,000 [about US$16,000] towards a new vehicle for Brecon Mountain Rescue Team in Wales. He offered the donation because his brother is a senior member of the team. The team's former control vehicle was written off after a collision in 2011.[15]
Personal life
Grant's wife Jane[3] is from New York.[11]
Grant is a fan of Aston Villa Football Club[16] and has been known to include the names of Aston Villa players in his books.[17]
In 2013, the Daily Mail quoted him saying that he writes while high on marijuana, and that he has smoked cannabis five nights a week for 44 years.[18] However, in a phone interview in November 2013, he clarified his comments to the Irish Examiner, saying he's never written while high. "Yeah, that's true," Child told The Post-Standard. "I mean, people say to me, 'There was that story in the newspaper,' and I say, "No, that's The Daily Mail.' In Britain, that's not a newspaper, you know, that's a scandal sheet where they make stuff up. It's not very reliable. And certainly I don't deny smoking the occasional joint, but I don't work when I'm stoned because you don't get much done that way." [19]
Novels and awards
Note: For consistency, ISBN shows Bantam (UK) hardcover, first printings only.
Other awards
- 2005 The Bob Kellogg Good Citizen Award for Outstanding Contribution to the Internet Writing Community[citation needed]
- 2013 Cartier Diamond Dagger, lifetime achievement by the Crime Writers' Association[24]
Short stories
- "James Penney's New Identity" from Fresh Blood 3 (edited by Mike Ripley and Maxim Jakubowski) and from Thriller (US)
- "The Snake Eater by the Numbers" from Like a Charm (edited by Karin Slaughter)
- "Ten Keys" from The Cocaine Chronicles (edited by Jervey Tervalon and Gary Phillips)
- "The Greatest Trick of All" from Greatest Hits (edited by Robert J Randisi)
- "Guy Walks into a Bar..." A prequel to Gone Tomorrow published in The New York Times[25]
- "Me & Mr. Rafferty" from The Dark End of the Street (edited by Jonathan Santlofer and S. J. Rozan)
- "The Bodyguard" from First Thrills (edited by Lee Child)
- "Second Son" (Electronic short story about Jack Reacher)
- "Addicted to Sweetness" from The Rich and the Dead (edited by Nelson DeMille)
- "Everyone Talks" (Reacher short story published in the June/July 2012 US edition of Esquire Magazine)
- "Deep Down" (Electronic short story about Jack Reacher, published 16 June 2012)
- "High Heat" (Electronic short story about Jack Reacher, published 6 August 2013)
- "Good and Valuable Consideration" from Face Off (edited by David Baldacci)
- "Not a Drill" (Electronic short story about Jack Reacher, Published 29 July 2014)
- "Small Wars" (Electronic short story about Jack Reacher, 18 August 2015)
References
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- ↑ Alison Flood, Students offered scholarships from fictional crimefighter, Jack Reacher, Guardian
- ↑ "People and Publishing: Milestones", Locus, April 2009, p.8
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- ↑ "Exclusive interview with ace author Child in matchday programme". Aston Villa Football Club. 15 September 2011.
- ↑ Interview with Simon Mayo on Radio 2 on 1st September 2014.
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- ↑ Child, Lee (6 June 2009). "Guy Walks Into a Bar... ". The New York Times.
External links
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Wikimedia Commons has media related to [[commons:Lua error in Module:WikidataIB at line 506: attempt to index field 'wikibase' (a nil value).|Lua error in Module:WikidataIB at line 506: attempt to index field 'wikibase' (a nil value).]]. |
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Wikiquote has quotations related to: Lee Child |
- Lee Child's & Jack Reacher's Official Web Site, featuring Lee Child's blog, forum, bibliography and excerpts
- Reacher Creatures Fan Site
- Lee Child's books from U.S. Publisher Bantam Dell
- Lee Child at the Internet Book List
- Macavity Awards Site
- Podcast interview with Lee Child
- Daily Telegraph, 1 April 2007
- Daily Telegraph, 14 July 2007
- Times, 25 August 2012
- Use dmy dates from October 2013
- Use British English from October 2013
- Articles with unsourced statements from September 2014
- Articles with unsourced statements from May 2013
- Commons category link from Wikidata
- 1954 births
- Living people
- People from Coventry
- English thriller writers
- English crime fiction writers
- People educated at King Edward's School, Birmingham
- Alumni of the University of Sheffield
- People from Birmingham, West Midlands
- Nero Award winners
- Anthony Award winners
- Barry Award winners