Craig Thomas (1942 – 4 April 2011) was a Welsh author of thrillers, most notably the Mitchell Gant and Kenneth Aubrey series of novels.

Background

Thomas was the son of the '' Western Mail''

rugby union Rugby union football, commonly known simply as rugby union in English-speaking countries and rugby 15/XV in non-English-speaking world, Anglophone Europe, or often just rugby, is a Contact sport#Terminology, close-contact team sport that orig ...

writer JBG Thomas. He was educated at Cardiff High School. He graduated from University College, Cardiff in 1967, obtaining his M.A. after completing a thesis on

Thomas Hardy Thomas Hardy (2 June 1840 – 11 January 1928) was an English novelist and poet. A Literary realism, Victorian realist in the tradition of George Eliot, he was influenced both in his novels and in his poetry by Romanticism, including the poetry ...

. Thomas became an English teacher, working at Stafford Girl’s High School, Shire Oak Grammar School in Walsall Wood, where he was Head of the English Department, as well as King Edward VI Grammar School in Lichfield and other

grammar schools A grammar school is one of several different types of school in the history of education in the United Kingdom and other English-speaking countries, originally a Latin school, school teaching Latin, but more recently an academically oriented Se ...

in the West Midlands.

Writing career

After unsuccessfully trying script writing for radio, Thomas wrote part-time, with his wife as editor, in two fields: philosophical thoughts in books of essays; and

techno-thriller A techno-thriller or technothriller is a hybrid genre drawing from science fiction, thrillers, spy fiction, action, and war novels. They include a disproportionate amount (relative to other genres) of technical details on their subject matter ...

s, a genre whose invention is often attributed to the better-known

Tom Clancy Thomas Leo Clancy Jr. (April 12, 1947 – October 1, 2013) was an American novelist. He is best known for his technically detailed espionage and military science, military-science storylines set during and after the Cold War. Seventeen of ...

, though many fans feel that Thomas was its true originator. Most of Thomas's novels are set within

MI6 The Secret Intelligence Service (SIS), commonly known as MI6 ( Military Intelligence, Section 6), is the foreign intelligence service of the United Kingdom, tasked mainly with the covert overseas collection and analysis of human intelligenc ...

and feature the characters of Sir Kenneth Aubrey and Patrick Hyde. His best-known novel was ''

Firefox Mozilla Firefox, or simply Firefox, is a free and open-source web browser developed by the Mozilla Foundation and its subsidiary, the Mozilla Corporation. It uses the Gecko rendering engine to display web pages, which implements curr ...

'', which brought him to global prominence and spawned a successful

film adaptation A film adaptation transfers the details or story of an existing source text, such as a novel, into a feature film. This transfer can involve adapting most details of the source text closely, including characters or plot points, or the original sou ...

, directed by and starring

Clint Eastwood Clinton Eastwood Jr. (born May 31, 1930) is an American actor and film director. After achieving success in the Western (genre), Western TV series ''Rawhide (TV series), Rawhide'', Eastwood rose to international fame with his role as the "Ma ...

. After publishing his third novel, the

Cold War The Cold War was a period of global Geopolitics, geopolitical rivalry between the United States (US) and the Soviet Union (USSR) and their respective allies, the capitalist Western Bloc and communist Eastern Bloc, which lasted from 1947 unt ...

espionage thriller ''Wolfsbane'', he left teaching altogether, in 1977. His later books include ''Snow Falcon'' and ''A Different War''. Shortly before his death he finished a two-volume commentary on

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany, the country of the Germans and German things **Germania (Roman era) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizenship in Germany, see also Ge ...

philosopher

Friedrich Nietzsche Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche (15 October 1844 – 25 August 1900) was a German philosopher. He began his career as a classical philology, classical philologist, turning to philosophy early in his academic career. In 1869, aged 24, Nietzsche bec ...

. Thomas and his wife Jill had lived in Whittington near

Lichfield Lichfield () is a city status in the United Kingdom, cathedral city and Civil parishes in England, civil parish in Staffordshire, England. Lichfield is situated south-east of the county town of Stafford, north-east of Walsall, north-west of ...

Staffordshire Staffordshire (; postal abbreviation ''Staffs''.) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in the West Midlands (region), West Midlands of England. It borders Cheshire to the north-west, Derbyshire and Leicestershire to the east, ...

for over 25 years, but moved to

Somerset Somerset ( , ), Archaism, archaically Somersetshire ( , , ) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South West England. It is bordered by the Bristol Channel, Gloucestershire, and Bristol to the north, Wiltshire to the east ...

in 2010. He died at age 68 on 4 April 2011 from

pneumonia Pneumonia is an Inflammation, inflammatory condition of the lung primarily affecting the small air sacs known as Pulmonary alveolus, alveoli. Symptoms typically include some combination of Cough#Classification, productive or dry cough, ches ...

, following a short battle with

acute myeloid leukemia Acute myeloid leukemia (AML) is a cancer of the myeloid line of blood cells, characterized by the rapid growth of abnormal cells that build up in the bone marrow and blood and interfere with haematopoiesis, normal blood cell production. Sympt ...

Publications

* '' Rat Trap'' – Michael Joseph, London (1976) * ''

'' – Michael Joseph, London (1977) * ''Wolfsbane'' – Michael Joseph, London (1978) * ''Moscow 5000'' – Michael Joseph, London (1979) (as David Grant) * ''Snow Falcon'' – Michael Joseph, London (1980) * ''Emerald Decision'' – Michael Joseph, London (1980) (as David Grant) * ''Sea Leopard'' – Michael Joseph, London (1981) * ''Jade Tiger'' – Michael Joseph, London (1982) * '' Firefox Down'' – Michael Joseph, London (1983) * ''The Bear's Tears'' – Michael Joseph, London (1985) (published in the United States as ''Lion's Run'') * '' Winter Hawk'' – Collins, London (1987) * ''All the Grey Cats'' – Collins, London (1988) (published in the United States as ''Wildcat'' (1989)) * ''The Last Raven'' – Collins, London (1990) * ''A Hooded Crow'' – HarperCollins, London (1992) * ''Playing with Cobras'' – HarperCollins, London (1993) * ''A Wild Justice'' – HarperCollins, London (1995) * ''A Different War'' – Little Brown, (1997) * ''Slipping into Shadow'' – Little Brown (1998) ; Non-fiction * ''There to Here: Ideas of Political Society'' – HarperPerennial, London (1991)

References

External links

Bio at Shropshire County CouncilCraig Thomas - The Unofficial Companion
{{DEFAULTSORT:Thomas, Craig Alumni of Cardiff University Welsh schoolteachers Welsh novelists Techno-thriller writers Deaths from pneumonia in England Deaths from leukemia in England 1942 births 2011 deaths Writers from Cardiff 20th-century Welsh novelists British thriller writers