Henry Slesar

Born in Brooklyn on June 12, 1927, Henry Slesar built a remarkably versatile writing career. He became especially admired for short stories with neat, surprising endings, and his work appeared in magazines such as Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine, Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine, Amazing Stories, and Fantastic.

A turning point came when Alfred Hitchcock bought one of his stories for adaptation, beginning a productive connection that helped bring Slesar's work to a wider audience. Beyond print fiction, he wrote extensively for television, including hundreds of scripts, and he became well known for his work on daytime dramas such as The Edge of Night and Murder, She Wrote.

Slesar died on April 2, 2002. He is still remembered as a writer who could be funny, dark, and unsettling all at once, with an unusual gift for making a final line land perfectly.