John Sandford

John Roswell Camp (born February 23, 1944), known professionally as John Sandford, is an American New York Times best-selling author, novelist, former journalist, and recipient of the Pulitzer Prize.

Early life

Camp was born in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, the son of Anne Agnes (Barron) and Roswell Sandford Camp. He graduated from Cedar Rapids Washington High School in 1962. He received a bachelor's degree in American history and literature and a master's in journalism, both from the University of Iowa.

Career

From 1971 to 1978, Camp wrote for The Miami Herald. In 1978, he moved to Saint Paul, Minnesota and started writing for The Saint Paul Pioneer Press as a general assignment reporter; in 1980, he became a daily columnist. That year, he was a Pulitzer finalist for a series of stories on Native American culture. In 1985, during the Midwest farm crisis, he wrote a series titled "Life on the Land: an American Farm Family," which followed a typical southwest Minnesota farm family through the course of a full year. For that work, he won the annual Pulitzer Prize for Feature Writing and the American Society of Newspaper Editors award for Non-Deadline Feature Writing. While working at the Pioneer Press, he wrote two non-fiction books, "The Eye and the Heart: The Watercolors of John Stuart Ingle" and "Plastic Surgery: The Kindest Cut," with University of Minnesota surgeon Bruce Cunningham. He worked part-time at the Pioneer Press in 1989 and left the following year.

Fiction writer

In 1989, Camp wrote two novels that would each spawn a popular series. The Fool's Run (Kidd series) was published under his own name, but the publisher asked him to provide a pseudonym for Rules of Prey (Prey series), so it was published under the name John Sandford. After the Prey series proved to be more popular, with its charismatic protagonist Lucas Davenport, The Fool's Run and all of its sequels were published under John Sandford.

In 2007, Camp started a third series (also under the name John Sandford), featuring Virgil Flowers, who is a supporting character in some of the Prey novels, including Invisible Prey and Storm Prey.

A fourth series, featuring Letty Davenport, daughter of Lucas Davenport of the Prey series, was launched in 2022.

All of Camp's novels have appeared, in one format or another, on The New York Times bestseller list. Twenty-eight have debuted at #1 on the “Hardcover” or “Combined” lists.

Camp is an avid fiction reader himself. When asked in 2018, "What's your favorite book of all time?" by The New York Times, he responded: "An impossible question. If you put a gun to my head—say a .40-caliber Walther PPQ, or maybe a .45 ACP Colt Gold Cup—I'd say The Once and Future King by T. H. White." Both weapons he mentioned make appearances in many of his novels.

Camp is a personal friend and hunting companion of fellow Minnesota author Chuck Logan.

Published works

Prey series

Lucas Davenport is the protagonist of the Prey series. In the first three novels, he is a maverick detective with the Minneapolis Police Department. At the end of Eyes of Prey, he's forced to resign to avoid excessive force charges, partly due to his knowledge of the connection of a senior police officer to that case. He returns in Night Prey as a deputy chief (a political appointment), running his own intelligence unit. Beginning with Naked Prey, Davenport is an investigator for the Minnesota Department of Public Safety's Bureau of Criminal Apprehension (BCA), acting occasionally as a special troubleshooter for the governor of Minnesota in politically sensitive cases. He serves in that capacity through Gathering Prey, at the end of which he quits working for the BCA, later becoming a United States Marshal.

The novel Mind Prey was sold for an ABC TV movie, and Davenport was portrayed by Eriq LaSalle. Another of the novels, Certain Prey, was adapted into a movie in 2011 by USA Network, starring Mark Harmon as Davenport. A television series, titled Rules of Prey, was ordered by MGM+, starring Jensen Ackles as Davenport.

Rules of Prey (1989) ISBN 0-399-13465-4

Shadow Prey (1990) ISBN 0-399-13543-X

Eyes of Prey (1991) ISBN 0-399-13629-0

Silent Prey (1992) ISBN 0-399-13742-4

Winter Prey (1993) ISBN 0-399-13815-3

Night Prey (1994) ISBN 0-399-13914-1

Mind Prey (1995) ISBN 0-399-14009-3

Sudden Prey (1996) ISBN 0-399-14138-3

Secret Prey (1998) ISBN 0-399-14382-3

Certain Prey (1999) ISBN 0-399-14496-X

Easy Prey (2000) ISBN 0-399-14613-X

Chosen Prey (2001) ISBN 0-399-14728-4

Mortal Prey (2002) ISBN 0-399-14863-9

Naked Prey (2003) ISBN 0-399-15043-9

Hidden Prey (2004) ISBN 0-399-15180-X

Broken Prey (2005) ISBN 0-399-15272-5

Invisible Prey (2007) ISBN 978-0-399-15421-8

Phantom Prey (2008) ISBN 978-0-399-15500-0

Wicked Prey (2009) ISBN 0-399-15567-8

Storm Prey (2010) ISBN 0-399-15649-6

Buried Prey (2011) ISBN 0-399-15738-7

Stolen Prey (2012) ISBN 0-399-15768-9

Silken Prey (2013) ISBN 0-399-15931-2

Field of Prey (2014) ISBN 0-399-16238-0

Gathering Prey (2015) ISBN 0-399-16879-6

Extreme Prey (2016) ISBN 978-0-399-17605-0

Golden Prey (2017) ISBN 0-399-18457-0

Twisted Prey (2018) ISBN 0-73521735-1

Neon Prey (2019) ISBN 978-0525536581

Masked Prey (2020) ISBN 978-0525539520

Ocean Prey (2021) ISBN 978-0593087022

Righteous Prey (2022) ISBN 978-0593422472

Judgment Prey (October 3, 2023) ISBN 978-0593542811

Toxic Prey (April 9, 2024) ISBN 978-0593714492

Lethal Prey (March 25, 2025) ISBN 978-0593718407

Revenge Prey (April 7, 2026) ISBN 978-0593852064

From Ocean Prey (#31) on, the lead in the Prey books has been shared: Lucas Davenport and Virgil Flowers in Ocean Prey, Righteous Prey, Judgment Prey, and Lethal Prey; Lucas Davenport and Letty Davenport in Toxic Prey.

Kidd series

The Fool's Run (1989), by John Camp; reissued 1996 as by Sandford ISBN 0-8050-0990-6

The Empress File (1991), by John Camp; reissued 1995 as by Sandford ISBN 0-8050-1545-0

The Devil's Code (2000) ISBN 0-399-14650-4

The Hanged Man's Song (2003) ISBN 0-399-15139-7

Kidd also has a prominent role in Silken Prey (Prey series #23) and Extreme Prey (Prey series #26).