William Diehl was born in 1924 in Jamaica, New York. At age 17, he lied about his age to enlist in the Army Air Corps, volunteering for the US Army Corps Aviation Cadet Program. After washing out of pilot school, he served as a ball turret gunner on a B-24 Liberator where he flew 24 missions over Germany during World War II. He was the recipient of the Distinguished Flying Cross, Purple Heart and Air Medal with three Oak Leaf Clusters.

After the war, he enrolled at the University of Missouri and graduated with a degree in creative writing and history. He moved to Atlanta in 1949 and joined the staff of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution where he served as a writer, photojournalist and editor.

He remained at the paper as a reporter and columnist until 1955, then freelanced for several years. In 1960 he became the first managing editor of Atlanta Magazine. He taught himself how to take photographs for his stories and later worked as a freelance photographer.

He started on the plot of his first novel, "Sharky's Machine", while serving as a juror. Diehl, then 50, was bored by the trial and started writing the story on a notepad. The book was published in 1978.

His other novels, all with plot lines fueled by murder, greed, romance and various forms of mayhem, included "Chameleon" (1981), "Hooligans" (1984), "The Horse" (1987), "27" (1990), "Primal Fear" (1992), "Show of Evil" (1995), "Reign in Hell" (1997) and "Eureka" (2002).

He had been working on another novel "Seven Ways to Die," when he died in 2006 at Emory University Hospital. That book was completed by a colleague, Kenneth Atchity, based on over 400 pages of manuscript Diehl had left behind, a working outline, notes and chapter drafts. The book was published in early 2012.

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William Diehl

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