John’s first novel, Sunburn, won the San Francisco Foundation’s Joseph Henry Jackson Award for best novel by a California author; Dead Irish, The 13th Jurorand The Keeper were nominees for the Shamus, Anthony and Silver Falchion Best Mystery/Crime Novel, respectively; The 13th Juror is included in the ITW publication “100 Must-Read Thrillers Of All Time.” Hard Evidence appears in “The Complete Idiot’s Guide to the Ultimate Reading List.” Guilt was a Readers Digest Select Edition choice. The Motive was an Audie Finalist of the Audio Publishers Association. The Mercy Rule, Nothing but the Truth, The Suspect, and The Fallhave been major market Book Club selections. The Suspect was also the 2007 One Book Sacramento choice, and the American Author’s Association chose it as its Book of the Year. The Ophelia Cut, Betrayal, and A Plague of Secrets were each Top Five selections of Strand Magazine’s “Books of the Year.” Several of John’s books have been Main Selections of one or more of the Literary Guild, Mystery Guild, and Book of the John is the recipient of the International Thriller Writers’ Silver Bullet Award to recognize outstanding and meritorious achievement in the pursuit of literacy and the love of reading. In that vein, among many other charitable contributions, John has endowed the perennial $5,000 Maurice Prize for excellence in long-form fiction at the University of California at Davis. Of the first fifteen writers to have won this award, ten have gone on to become published authors. Also, the San Francisco Museum and Historical Society presented John with its Award of Merit to recognize the “intimate knowledge of San Francisco” portrayed in his novels; finally, both the California State Senate and California State Assembly have presented John with their Award of Merit and Certificate of Recognition, respectively.
A singer, songwriter, and musician, John founded Crow Art Records and produced David Grisman alum Joe Craven (“Django Latino”), Bel Air Hotel and Peninsula Hotel longtime house pianist Antonio Castilla de la Gala (“Date Night”), as well as two CDs of his own original music (“As The Crow Flies” and “Whiskey and Roses”).
Finally, John loves to cook. His original recipes have appeared in Gourmet Magazine and in the cookbook “A Taste of Murder.” (He also wrote the forward to Francine Brevetti’s paean to the famous San Francisco eatery Fior d’Italia entitled The Fabulous Fior: 100 Years in an Italian Kitchen.)
