@ William Deverell.com

Winner of the Dashiell Hammett Award for Literary Excellence in North American Crime Writing

William Deverell - Biographical Data

Bill Deverell worked as a journalist for seven years, with Canadian Press in Montreal, the Vancouver Sun and the Saskatoon Star-Phoenix, where he was night city editor while at the University of Saskatchewan law school and editor of the student newspaper.

As a member of the British Columbia, Alberta and Yukon Bars, he was counsel in more than a thousand criminal cases, including thirty murder trials, either as defender or prosecutor. He is a founding director, former president, now honorary director of the B. C. Civil Liberties Association.

His first novel, Needles, won the $50,000 Seal Prize in l979 and the Book of the Year Award in l98l. His subsequent novels include High Crimes, Mecca, The Dance of Shiva, Platinum Blues, Mindfield, Kill All the Lawyers, Street Legal - the Betrayal, and he is author of the true crime book A Life on Trial - The Case of Robert Frisbee, based on a notorious murder trial which he defended. He has also published numerous magazine articles and short stories. A feature film of Mindfield, for which he wrote the screenplay, was released in l990.

The Laughing Falcon, new in paperback, was published in November, 2001. His new novel, Mind Games, is a Fall 2003 release from McClelland & Stewart Ltd. Platinum Blues and Slander are being returned to print at the same time by ECW Press, which reprinted Needles and Trial of Passion in 2002.

Trial of Passion won the 1997 Arthur Ellis prize in crime writing in Canada, and the Dashiell Hammett award, for literary excellence in crime writing in North America. His novels have been translated into ten languages and sold worldwide.

He wrote the screenplay Shellgame for CBC-TV drama, which served as the pilot for CBC's long-running series Street Legal, and he is the creator of that series, which has run internationally in more than 50 countries. He also authored several one-hour radio plays performed by the CBC in the Scales of Justice series and numerous film or TV scripts.

In 1991-92, he served as Visiting Professor in the Creative Writing Department, University of Victoria. He served on the board of the Victoria Literary Arts Festival and is an honourary director of Vancouver’s Word on the Street

In 1994 he served as Chair of the Writers' Union of Canada, and again in 1999, and he is a member of the Canadian Writers Guild and PEN International.

He lives on Pender Island, British Columbia, and in Costa Rica at these addresses:

Box 14, R.R. 1,
North Pender Island, B.C.
V0N 2M0, 250 629-6622, fax 629-6628

Apartado 92,
Quepos, Costa Rica,
011 506 777-1092