John Wyndham was born in 1903. He tried a number of careers, including farming, law, commercial art and advertising, and starting writing short stories in 1925. From 1930-1939 he wrote stories of various kinds under different names, almost exclusively for American publications, while also writing detective novels. After military service in the Second World War, he went back to his writing and decided to try a modified form of science fiction, a form he called `logical fantasy'. Several of his novels have become classics, including THE DAY OF THE TRIFFIDS, THE CHRYSALIDS AND the KRAKEN WAKES. He died in 1969.