Once described as one of the most iconoclastic, acerbic, empathetic, brutal writers that the New Wave threw up in the early '70s, Steve J. Spears was raised in Mile End, an inner suburb of Adelaide, South Australia. After completing his secondary education he studied law at the University of Adelaide and became involved in several university revues In addition to performing, he also wrote scripts, and for a time collaborated with fellow student and later playwright Rob George. Spears later abandoned his law degree in order to work in the theatre Over the years, the latter has toured Australia and been performed in London and San Francisco, on off-Broadway, and in South America. Spears eventually moved to Sydney and continued to write plays for the theatre and radio and documentaries. He acted in films and on stage and was a founding member of the Balmain Boys cabaret troupe. Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, he also wrote scripts for television series, including soap operas, dramas, young-adult television, and sit-coms. After becoming disillusioned with writing for television, Spears began writing crime fiction in the early 2000s. He died in 2007 -- excerpted from AustLit.