Lionel White

Lionel White (9 July 1905 – 26 December 1985) was an American journalist and crime novelist, several of whose dark, noirish stories were made into films. His books include The Snatchers (made into a film as The Night of the Following Day directed by Hubert Cornfield and starring Marlon Brando), The Money Trap (made into a movie by Burt Kennedy starring Glenn Ford and Elke Sommer), Clean Break (adapted by Stanley Kubrick as the basis for his 1956 film The Killing), Obsession (adapted by Jean-Luc Godard as the basis for his 1965 film Pierrot le fou and by the Finnish director Seppo Huunonen for the 1974 film The Hair), and Rafferty, adapted by 1980 Soviet Lenfilm production of the same title.

White (also known as L.W. Blanco) had been a crime reporter and began writing suspense novels in the 1950s. He wrote more than 35 books, all translated into a number of different languages. His earlier novels were published as Gold Medal crime fiction, but when Duttons began a line of mystery and suspense books, he also wrote for them. He was best known as what a New York Times review described as "the master of the big caper."

Seven years after White's death, director Quentin Tarantino credited him, among others, as an inspiration in his 1992 film Reservoir Dogs.