Occupation Novelist Alma mater Hanover College | Nationality American Education Hanover College | |
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Genre Hardboiled crime fiction, thriller Books Nine Years Gone, The Abbey, The Outsider, By Any Means, The Outsider ‑ Free Prev | ||
Chris Culver is the pen name of an American author of crime fiction and thrillers. His books are set in and around the Midwestern United States. He is well known for his works featuring IMPD Detective Ashraf (Ash) Rashid. His debut novel, The Abbey, was on The New York Times bestseller list for 16 weeks.
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Background
Chris Culver was born in Tulsa, Oklahoma and moved to Chickasaw, Oklahoma shortly thereafter. He and his family moved to Newburgh, Indiana when he was seven years old.
Chris Culver read a lot as a child in elementary school. His favorite authors at that time were J. R. R. Tolkien and Stephen King. His love of books extended to the classroom where he even sneaked extra books beneath his desk and read during class. In fifth grade, he did a book report on Michael Crichton’s The Andromeda Strain since the assignment was to read something scary and report what made it so. While his fellow classmates chose to write about ghosts and things that go bump in the night, he wrote about the horrors of biological warfare.
He first became interested in writing crime fiction after picking up a dog-eared, coffee-stained paperback copy of Mickey Spillane's I, the Jury in a library book sale.
Chris Culver completed his undergraduate studies at Hanover College, a private liberal arts school. There he majored in philosophy and met his future wife. Afterwards, he attended law school. He then enrolled in a PhD program in philosophy at Purdue, but left before completing his full degree when his wife was offered a faculty position in Arkansas.
After graduate school, Chris Culver taught classes in ethics, the philosophy of religion, and religious studies at a small university in Arkansas. It was during this time that he wrote his first Ash Rashid novel. He credits his inspiration for the character creation to his students and their hardships. About Ash Rashid, he writes, "In a lot of ways, he's my idea of a hero. He doesn't have special powers or abilities, but he tries his best to do what's right. People occasionally ask me if he's based on a real person. He's not, but I hope there are people like him out there. The world needs people like that." He chose to write Ash Rashid as a Muslim detective partly to add depth to his background and make him seems more human and partly because he was "tired of reading books and seeing movies that portray all Muslims as terrorists of zealots."
He currently lives near St. Louis, MO with his family.
Career
The Abbey was the fourth novel Chris Culver wrote, but the first he considered good enough to publish. He wrote ten query letters to literary agents. They either did not have interest in the book, didn't respond, or were unsure of its potential on the market. He then decided to self-publish The Abbey in February 2011. He was pleased and surprised that he sold so well on his own. As of early 2013, his e-book sales totaled more than 750,000 copies. The early success attracted the attention of a literary agent and publisher, Hachette Book Group with whom he sold three Ash Rashid series books.
He published two books, Just Run and Nine Years Gone without a publisher in 2011 and 2014, respectively. In December 2014, Chris Culver announced on Facebook that Hachette is no longer publishing the Ash Rashid series. However, he continued to publish the series on his own.