Edward Joseph Gorman was born on November 2, 1941 in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. He spent 20 years in the advertising industry before leaving to write full-time in 1984. Since then, he has been incredibly prolific, averaging 2-3 novels a year in addition to many short stories, editing anthologies, and founding and editing Mystery Scene, the new magazine of the mystery field. He has written in many genres, particularly crime, mystery, western, and horror. Most of his novels are set in Iowa. His pseudonyms include E.J. Gorman, Daniel Ransom, Edward Gorman Jr., Robert David Chase, and Richard Driscoll.