VJ Books Presents Author Irving Wallace!
 Irving Wallace (March 19, 1916 _ June 29, 1990) was an
American best-selling author and screenwriter. Wallace was known for his
heavily researched novels, many with a sexual theme. One critic
described him "as the most successful of all the many exponents of junk
fiction perhaps because he took it all so seriously, not to say
lugubriously"
. Wallace was a blue-collar writer who wrote for a blue-collar audience.
Most critics were scornful of his novels' flat prose and pedestrian
characters.
Wallace was born in Chicago, Illinois
to Bessie Liss and Alexander Wallace (an Americanized version of the original family name of Wallechinsky). The family was Jewish and originally from Russia. Wallace was named after his maternal grandfather, a bookkeeper and Talmudic scholar of Narewka. Wallace grew up in Kenosha, Wisconsin, where he attended Kenosha Central High School. He was the father of Olympic historian David Wallechinsky and author Amy Wallace.
Wallace began selling stories to magazines when he was a teenager. In the Second World War
Wallace served in the Frank Capra unit in Fort Fox along with Theodor Seuss Geisel _ better known as Dr Seuss _ and continued to write for magazines. He also served in the First Motion Picture Unit of the Army Air Force. Soon, however, Wallace turned to a more lucrative job as a Hollywood screenwriter. He collaborated on such films as The West Point Story (1950), Split Second (1953), Meet Me at the Fair (1953), and The Big Circus (1959). He also contributed at least one script to the western television program "Have Gun, Will Travel".
After an unsatisfying stint in Hollywood, he devoted himself
full-time to writing books. He published his first non-fiction work in
1955,
The Fabulous Originals, and his first fiction offering, The Sins of Philip Fleming, in 1959. The latter, ignored by critics, was followed by the enormously successful The Chapman Report. Wallace published 33 books during his lifetime, translated into 31 languages.
Irving Wallace was married to Sylvia Wallace, a former magazine writer and editor. Her first novel,
The Fountains, was an American best-seller and published in twelve foreign editions. Her second novel, Empress, was published in 1980. She also helped him to produce, along with their two children, The Book of Lists #2 and The Intimate Sex Lives Of Famous People. Sylvia Wallace died October 20, 2006 at the age of 89.
Several of Wallace's books have been made into films. Among his best known books are
The Chapman Report (1960), The Prize (1962), The Word (1972) and The Fan Club (1974).
Similar Authors: Eric Van Lustbader Michael Dibdin Frederick Forsyth James Twining
To see Irving Wallace's bibliography, click here or scroll to the bottom of the page.
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