Michael Koryta
Michael Koryta (pronounced Ko-ree-ta) is the New York Times-bestselling author of 14 suspense novels. His work has been praised by Stephen King, Michael Connelly, Lee Child, Dean Koontz, James Patterson, Dennis Lehane, Daniel Woodrell, Ron Rash, and Scott Smith among many others, and has been translated into more than 20 languages. His books have won or been nominated for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, Edgar® Award, Shamus Award, Barry Award, Quill Award, International Thriller Writers Award, and the Golden Dagger. They've been selected as "best books of the year" by publications as diverse as the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Amazon.com, O the Oprah Magazine, Entertainment Weekly, People, Reader's Digest, iBooks, and Kirkus Reviews.
His recent thriller Those Who Wish Me Dead was named the summer's best thriller by both Amazon and Entertainment Weekly, and was selected as one of the year's best books by more than 10 publications. The audio version was named one of the best audio books of the year, as well, the second time that Robert Petkoff's narration of Michael's work has earned such an honor. The novel is currently being adapted as a major motion picture by 20th Century Fox.
Michael's previous work ranges from a trio of supernatural novels--So Cold the River, The Cypress House, and The Ridge, which were all named New York Times notable books of the year and earned starred reviews from Publishers Weekly--to stand-alone crime novels such as The Prophet (A New York Times bestseller) and Envy the Night (selected as a Reader's Digest condensed book), to a series of award-winning novels featuring private investigator Lincoln Perry--Tonight I Said Goodbye, Sorrow's Anthem, A Welcome Grave, and The Silent Hour.
Various film and television adaptations of the books are underway, with The Prophet, So Cold the River, The Cypress House, and Those Who Wish Me Dead all optioned as feature films, and the Lincoln Perry series and The Ridge being developed for television. Michael has written for the screen in both feature film and television. Oscar and Emmy winners are attached to every project.
Before turning to writing full-time, Michael worked as a private investigator and as a newspaper reporter, and taught at the Indiana University School of Journalism. He began working for a private investigator as an intern while in high school, turned it into his day job in the early stages of his writing career, and still maintains an interest in the firm. As a journalist, he won numerous awards from the Society of Professional Journalists.
Michael's first novel, the Edgar-nominated Tonight I Said Goodbye was accepted for publication when he was 20 years old. He wrote his first two published novels before graduating from college, and was published in nearly 10 languages before he fulfilled the "writing requirement" classes required for his diploma.
Michael was raised in Bloomington, Indiana, where he graduated from Bloomington North High School in 2001, and later graduated from Indiana University with a bachelor's degree in criminal justice. In 2008 he was honored as a "distinguished young alumni" by Indiana University, and in 2010 he was named "distinguished alumni' by the criminal justice department.
Michael's passions outside of writing and reading involve a variety of outdoor pursuits - hiking, camping, boating, and fishing are all likely to occupy his free time when he's not working on a new book. Some of his favorite spots in the world are the Beartooth Mountains, the setting of Those Who Wish Me Dead and a place to which he returns at least twice a year; the flowages of the Northwoods in Wisconsin, where he began fishing with his father as a child and still returns each fall; St. Petersburg, FL, and the Maine coast.
“...what still blew them all away was time itself, the days and months and the years, oh yes, the years. They went faster than anything man had the capacity to invent, so fast that for a while they fooled you into thinking they were slow, and was there any crueler trick than that?”
“You became what you wanted to become. That's what Ezra believe. You could become it if you tried hard enough, could take what you really were and change it, force-feed yourself a new life until it became your old life, too, blurred together until a better self emerged.”