John Creasey was born in Southfields, Surrey, England on September 17th 1908, and died on June 9th 1973 in Tucson Arizona, USA. He was the seventh of nine children in a working class home. He became an English author of crime thrillers, published 562 books under 28 different pseudonyms, keeping to a consistently high standard of quality throughout. He invented many famous characters who would appear in a whole series of novels. Probably the most famous of these is Gideon of Scotland Yard but others include Department Z, The Toff, Inspector Roger West, and The Baron. After publishing a book in 1930 and a crime thriller in 1932 he was able to turn to full time writing by 1935. He married Jean and had 2 sons. He later married a further 3 times.