Sue Grafton

Novelist

Sue Grafton was born in Louisville, Kentucky, United States on April 24th, 1940 and is the Novelist. At the age of 77, Sue Grafton biography, profession, age, height, weight, eye color, hair color, build, measurements, education, career, dating/affair, family, news updates, and networth are available.

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Date of Birth
April 24, 1940
Nationality
United States
Place of Birth
Louisville, Kentucky, United States
Death Date
Dec 28, 2017 (age 77)
Zodiac Sign
Taurus
Networth
$75 Million
Profession
Actor, Journalist, Novelist, Screenwriter, Writer
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Sue Grafton Height, Weight, Eye Color and Hair Color

At 77 years old, Sue Grafton physical status not available right now. We will update Sue Grafton's height, weight, eye color, hair color, build, and measurements.

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Weight
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Hair Color
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Sue Grafton Religion, Education, and Hobbies
Religion
Not Available
Hobbies
Not Available
Education
University of Louisville
Sue Grafton Spouse(s), Children, Affair, Parents, and Family
Spouse(s)
Steven F. Humphrey
Children
Not Available
Dating / Affair
Not Available
Parents
C. W. Grafton (father)
Sue Grafton Life

Sue Taylor Grafton (April 24, 1940 – December 28, 2017) was an American writer of detective books.

She is best known as the author of the "alphabet series" ("A" Is for Alibi, etc.) Kinsey Millhone, a private investigator, appeared in Santa Teresa, California, where the fictional city of Santa Teresa is located.

Author Ross Macdonald's daughter, as the niece of detective novelist C. W. Grafton, had the most influence on her crime books, according to her.

She wrote screenplays for television shows before her success with this series.

Early life

Sue Grafton was born in Louisville, Kentucky, to C. W. Grafton (1909-1982) and Vivian Harnsberger, both of whom were Presbyterian missionaries' children.

Her father, a municipal bond attorney who also wrote mystery books, and her mother, a former high school chemistry teacher, was a former high school chemistry tutor. When she was three years old and returned when she was five, her father became enlisted in the Army during World War II and when she returned when she was five, her family's life started falling apart. Both parents became alcoholics and Grafton said, "I was left to raise myself from the age of five."

Ann Grafton and her older sister Ann grew up in Louisville, where she attended Atherton High School. She attended the University of Louisville (first year) and Western Kentucky State Teachers College (now Western Kentucky University) in her sophomore and junior years before graduating from the University of Louisville in 1961 with a bachelor's degree in English Literature and minors in humanities and fine arts. She was a founder of Pi Beta Phi.

Grafton served as a hospital admissions clerk, a cashier, and a medical secretary in Santa Monica and Santa Barbara, California, after graduating.

After recovering home from an operation to remove esophageal cancer caused by years of drinking and smoking, Grafton's mother died in 1960. Her father died in 1982, a few months before "A" Is for Alibi was published.

Personal life

Grafton married in 1959, aged 18, to James L. Flood, with whom she had a son and a daughter. By the time Grafton graduated from college in 1961, the two were divorced. She had been married to Al Schmidt in 1962, but her second marriage ended in protracted divorce and custody proceedings over their daughter.

In 1978, she married Steven F. Humphrey, her third husband. They divided their time between Santa Barbara, California, and Louisville, Kentucky; Humphrey taught at universities in both cities. The couple bought and restored Lincliff, a 28-acre (11 ha) Louisville estate once owned by hardware baron William Richardson Belknap in 2000.

Grafton died at Cottage Hospital in Santa Barbara on December 28, 2017, after a two-year battle with appendix cancer.

G.P. established an award in Grafton's memory in 2019. Putnam's Sons is under the control of the Mystery Writers of America.

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Sue Grafton Career

Writing career

Grafton's father was enamored of detective fiction and wrote at night. He taught Grafton lessons on the writing and editing process and preparing her to be a writer. Grafton began writing when she was 18 and finished her first book four years later when inspired by her father. She continued writing and published six more books. Only two of these seven books (Keziah Dane and The Lolly-Madonna War) were published. Grafton would later destroy the manuscripts for her five early, unpublished books.

Grafton turned to screenplays when she was struggling to find success with her books. Grafton wrote screenplays for television shows for the next 15 years, including Sex and the Single Parent; Mark, I Love You; and Nurse. Grafton co-wrote the screenplay for the Lolly-Madonna War and co-wrote the script for the feature film. Rod Steiger and Jeff Bridges appeared in the Lolly-Madonna XXX version, which was released in 1973. In 1979, she received a Christopher Award for her screenplay Walking Through the Fire. She co-wrote A Killer on the Run in collaboration with her husband Steven Humphrey, A Caribbean Mystery and Sparkling Cyanide for television, as well as co-wrote A Killer in Agatha Christie's The Family and Love on the Run. She is credited with the creation of the TV film Svengali (1983) on which the screenplay was based.

Her experience as a screenwriter taught her the fundamentals of writing a story, composing dialogue, and creating action sequences. Grafton returned to writing fiction once more. Grafton wondered if her ex-husband would be killed or maimed while going through a six-long fight. Her fantasies were so vivid that she decided to write them down.

Grafton was captivated by the mystery series whose titles were closely linked, such as John D. MacDonald's Travis McGee series, each of which had a color in the name, and Harry Kemelman's Rabbi Small collection, each of which featured a day of the week in the story. Grafton decided to write a series of novels whose names would follow the alphabet when reading Edward Goh's The Gashlycrumb Tinies, a picture book with an alphabetized list of children's death. She sat down and made a rundown of all of the crime-related words she knew right away.

These became the series now known as the "alphabet books" because they included sleuth and private investigator Kinsey Millhone. The series is set in Santa Teresa, a fictionalized Santa Barbara. Grafton followed Ross Macdonald, who created the fictional version of the city. "I may have been married young and had children," Grafton described Kinsey Millhone as her alter ego.

"A" Is for Alibi, a series that was released and set in 1982, begins the series. "B" Is for Burglar, followed by "C" Is for Corpse, each novel's name combining a letter with a letter, except X. Grafton was able to leave her screenwriting job and concentrate on her writing after the release of "G" Is for Gumshoe. Since Alibi's release of "A," a new episode is usually released each year or so. Each book's name was a point of skepticism. Grafton told Media Bistro in May 2009 that she was "just trying to figure out how to get from "U" to "Z" Is for Zero" and that "just because she knows the endgame name for Z [...] doesn't mean she knows what V, W, X, and Y will be." Grafton said that the film would end with "Z" Is for Zero, but that she died before she could begin writing it. Grafton would never allow a ghostwriter to write in her name, according to her daughter, and "the alphabet now ends at Y" if we are concerned.

Grafton's books have been published in 28 countries and in 26 languages. She declined to sell the film and television rights because writing screenplays "cured" her of the desire to work with Hollywood. (In Japan, TV films were adapted from "B" is for Burglar, while "D" is for Deadbeat.) Grafton warned her children that if they sold the film rights after her death, they would haunt them. For a total of about 400 weeks, the books in the series appeared on The New York Times Best Seller list. F is for Fugitive, the first to debut on the paperback chart; by 1995, "L" stands for Lawless, followed by ten more in the series.

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