Robert Crais is a contemporary American fiction author, born in Baton Rouge, Louisiana in 1954. Trained as a mechanical engineer, his life’s dream was to become a novelist.
From 1976 to the mid-eighties Robert Crais spent his career in Hollywood writing scripts for major network television series. Some of the well known series he wrote scripts for are “Hill Street Blues," “Cagney & Lacey” and “Miami Vice.” Crais was nominated for an Emmy for his work on “Hill Street Blues” but his favorite was “Cagney & Lacey.” The work he was the most proud of during this time period was an NBC mini-series documentary on the rise of the Ku Klux Klan to national prominence in the 1920’s. Crais resigned in the mid-eighties to pursue his dream.
Growing up with a family of oil refinery workers and three uncles and two cousins as police officers made detective fiction a natural choice for Crais. Crais’ success with his Elvis Cole novels has brought him much acclaim. His novel "Monkey’s Raincoat" was selected to be included in the "100 Favorite Mysteries of the Century" by the Independent Mystery Booksellers Association. His novel "L.A. Requiem" was a New York Times and Los Angeles Times best seller in 1999. In 2001 his novel "Hostage" was a world-wide bestseller and was released in a film adaptation starring Bruce Willis in 2005.
Crais is passionate about his writing. His literary influences have come from authors such as Ernest Hemingway, Raymond Chandler and John Steinbeck. Crais now lives in the Santa Monica Mountains.
