Patrick Alexander (writer)

Patrick Alexander (1926 – 1997[1] or 2003[2]) was a British novelist, thriller writer, journalist and screenwriter.

His novel Death of a Thin-Skinned Animal won the Crime Writers' Association "John Creasey Memorial Award"[3] and was filmed in 1981 as Le Professionnel starring Jean-Paul Belmondo. Stephen Hunter admits that Alexander's novel inspired his own novel Dead Zero and questions where the inspiration ends and the theft of Alexander's idea begins.[2]

Alexander was a chess fanatic; people in his novels often share his enthusiasm for the game. Death of a Thin-Skinned Animal features a "considerable description of a tournament" that chess player Stewart Reuben had organised.[4]

  1. ^ "Alexander, Patrick". Johnson and Alcock, literary agents. Archived from the original on 25 October 2012.
  2. ^ a b Hunter, Stephen (2010). Dead Zero. Simon & Schuster. ISBN 9781439149935.
  3. ^ "The John Creasey Dagger". Archived from the original on 15 November 2013.
  4. ^ Reuben, Stewart (October 1983). "Chess in Fiction". Chess. 48–49: 126.