Author. Born in St. John’s, Michigan the son of a machinist and a school teacher, he attended the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor. Employed as an accounts payable clerk by Xerox he became inspired to write his first novel ‘The Cold Cash War’ in 1977 when he became frustrated with bureaucracy and inefficiency. The following year he contributed a new comic fantasy novel, ‘Another Fine Myth,’ to the Starblaze imprint, and has since been credited as being the effective inventor of the fantasy humor genre. The popular Myth series continued to run for eighteen novels over twenty years. He also made his mark with the cult anthology series, ‘Thieves’ World.’ He created the world, shared the writing honors, and serving as the series editor. The first volume of twelve appeared in 1979. During the 1990s ongoing litigation with the IRS and chronic writers block affected his output, but he debuted another series of novels, this time featuring Willard Phule, and his Space Legion. Two of the Phule series made the New York Times best seller list ‘Phule’s Company’ in 1990 and 1992’s ‘Phule’s Paradise.’ He shared authorship with many authors on numerous projects; collaborators included Lynn Abbey, Linda Evans, Eric Del Carro, and most recently Jody Lynn Nye. His latest series debuted in 2008 with ‘Dragons Wild.’ That spring, he passed away suddenly and unexpectedly in his sleep days before a scheduled guest of honor role at a science fiction convention. In accordance with his wishes, no formal funeral was held, a simple cremation was followed by a memorial pub crawl in his honor in the French Quarter of New Orleans. (bio by: Iola)