Mark Philip David Billingham (born 2 July 1961) is an English writer whose series of "Tom Thorne" crime novels are considered bestsellers in that particular genre. He is also a TV scriptwriter and has become a familiar face as an actor and stand-up comic.Mark Billingham was born and brought up in Birmingham. Having worked for some years as an actor and more recently as a TV writer and stand-up comedian his first crime novel was published in 2001. Sleepyhead was an instant bestseller in the UK. It has been sold widely throughout the world and was published in the USA in the summer of 2002.
Though still occasionally working as a stand-up comic, Mark now concentrates on writing the series of crime novels featuring London-based detective Tom Thorne. The second novel, Scaredy Cat was published in July 2002 and was followed by Lazybones, The Burning Girl, Lifeless, Buried and Death Message. The newest novel, a standalone thriller called In The Dark is published in August 2008. Mark is at work on the next Tom Thorne novel called Blood Line and at work on the final book in a trilogy of thrillers for children - Triskellion - written under the pseudonym Will Peterson.
