Photo: Ulla Montan
Sample of authors
Spillane, Mickey
The American author Frank Morrison Spillane was born in Brooklyn, New York, to an Irish Catholic father and Scottish Presbyterian mother. He was christened twice; Michael was his Catholic baptismal name. At school he was known as Morrison Spillane, and as an adult he took the name Mickey, which was his father’s nickname for him.
When he was still very young, the family moved to Elizabeth, New J...
Literary figures
Boysie (Brian) Oakes
Gender: Male
He is recruited as a spy by mistake, and is regarded as tough, ruthless and bloodthirsty. In actual fact, he is an easy-going, forgetful and cowardly mummy’s boy, who hires gangsters to carry out the acts of violence he is ordered to do. This doesn’t prevent Brian ‘Boysie’ Oakes from making a career. It is simplest to describe him as a parody of James Bond, and John Gardner has written a suite of...