Review
Chester Himes was born in Jefferson City, Missouri in 1909, the son of a blacksmith who taught his skills at the city institute. By the late 1920s he was in gaol for armed robbery and it was in prison that he taught himself to write. And what a writer he turned out to be. A black man who wrote novels about black men involved in crime on both sides of the law, his finest works are probably the Grave Digger Jones and Coffin Ed Johnson series of novels, set in New York's Harlem district in the 1960s but which are as relevant now as they were then. Sallis has researched thoroughly on Himes and it shows. He's also a fan and that shows, too. This is a wonderful biography of a wonderful writer, written with love. (Kirkus UK)
Product Description
Chester Himes, in a writing career that spanned 50 years, produced many crime novels as well as two volumes of memoir and over 50 short stories. His first stories were written in jail where Himes served eight years of a 20 year sentence for armed robbery. This biography looks at his life and work.
