Bill Pronzini

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Bill Pronzini has been a professional writer almost as long as I've been alive (I'm sure he appreciates my pointing this out). In addition to his numerous excellent mystery and suspense novels, he's written dozens of short stories, and is a prolific anthologist as well. He's best known as creator of the "Nameless" detective. Though "Nameless" has appeared in 26 books and dozens of short stories, his name is never revealed, in part as an homage to Hammett's Continental Op, and partly because Pronzini based him so closely on his own character, a fact the author freely admits.

With a few exceptions, Pronzini's characters are ordinary people, not gutter scum or the pampered rich, which makes his heroes likable and his villains understandable. Nameless is the embodiment of this; fat, ethnic, a workaholic who spends his spare time reading his collection of pulps while knocking back a couple of beers. He's a walking repudiation of the superhero school of detectives.

While the "Nameless" series is as good as ever, with 1998's Boobytrap winning the Shamus award for best novel, Pronzini's nonseries work has really made a quantum leap in the last few years. Books like Nothing But The Night, Blue Lonesome, and A Wasteland Of Strangers have shown an increased sensitivity and feel for character, as well as garnering increasing critical notice. One possible explanation: Pronzini's marriage to mystery writer Marcia Muller. Marriage has a way of changing your perspective.