Brian Garfield, award-winning author, screenwriter and film producer, died December 29. He was 79. After publishing his first title, Range Justice, when he was 18, Garfield went on to write more than 70 books--westerns, mysteries and nonfiction. Nineteen films are based on his writings, including Death Wish. His violence-free and Edgar Award-winning novel Hopscotch was written in response to the vigilantism of Death Wish.
"Each book is like a different course in school," he said. "I really don't want to take the same course again and again. If the writer gets bored, heaven help the reader."
Garfield is the only person to have been president of both the Western Writers of America and the Mystery Writers of America. More than 20 million copies of his books were printed worldwide and translated into many foreign languages. His book The Thousand-Mile War: World War II in Alaska and the Aleutians was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in nonfiction.
In a tribute on its blog, Mysterious Press wrote: "We're very sad to share the news [about] author Brian Garfield... Brian was a fantastic writer and we were honored to publish an extensive portion of his backlist."