The Lineup: The World's Greatest Crime Writers Tell the Inside Story of Their Greatest Detectives

STEPHEN HUNTER

Stephen Hunter was born in Kansas City, Missouri, in 1946, and graduated from Northwestern University in 1968. He worked for the Baltimore Sun starting in 1971 as a copy reader, feature writer, and book review editor, and eventually became its movie critic, a position he held until 1996, when he assumed the same role for the Washington Post. His film criticism was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize on several occasions, and he was a finalist in 1995 and again in 1996; he won the coveted award in 2003. Two volumes of his criticism have been published: Violent Screen: A Critic’s 13 Years on the Front Lines of Movie Mayhem (1995) and Now Playing at the Valencia: Pulitzer Prize-Winning Essays on Movies (2005).

His first novel was The Master Sniper (1980), which was followed by The Second Saladin (1982), The Spanish Gambit (1985), and The Day Before Midnight (1989). Point of Impact (1993) introduced Bob Lee Swagger, also known as the Nailer. This was followed by Dirty White Boys (1994). Bob Lee’s father, Earl, starred in three novels: Hot Springs (2000), Pale Horse Coming (2001), and Havana (2003).

Point of Impact was filmed as Shooter in 2007, starring Mark Wahlberg as Bob Lee Swagger. Directed by Antoine Fuqua, with a screenplay by Jonathan Lemkin, it also starred Kate Mara and Danny Glover.

Hunter is married and lives in Baltimore.