Photo: Jon Kopaloff/FilmMagic (2006)
Sample of authors
Ellroy, James
Having revolutionized crime fiction in terms of language and style, James Ellroy is now one of America’s foremost contemporary crime writers. He was born Lee Earle Ellroy in Los Angles. His father, Armand Ellroy, was an accountant who moved in dubious Hollywood circles, for example as Rita Hayworth’s financial advisor. Ellroy’s mother, Geneva "Jean" Hilliker, was a nurse. Both parents were alcoh...
Literary figures
Arlette van der Valk
Gender: Female
When she was young, she was called Davidson, but the changed her surname after marrying Detective Superintendent Piet Van der Valk in Amsterdam. She is a temperamental, intelligent master-chef and music lover, a minor character in most of the novels about her husband. When he is murdered, Arlette Van der Valk exposes the perpetrator, and then continues as a private detective to solve cases on...