Rafael Yglesias was born on May 12, 1954. He dropped out of high school to finish his first novel, Hide Fox, and All After, which was published in 1972. He wrote three novels by the age of twenty-one and then stopped writing books between 1976 and 1984 to concentrated on starting a family. During this time, he made a living by writing screenplays. His other books include Hot Properties, Only Children, The Murderer Next Door, Fearless, and Dr. Neruda's Cure for Evil. A Happy Marriage won the 2009 Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Fiction. In 1992, he resumed writing screenplays. The first to be produced, Fearless, was an adaptation of his novel of the same title. He also wrote the screenplays for Death and the Maiden, Les Miserables, From Hell, and Dark Water.
