van de Wetering, Janwillem (1931 - 2008)

Genre: Children's Literature, Mystery, Non-Fiction

Van de Wetering had been a motorcycle gang member in South Africa, a Zen disciple in Japan, and a volunteer police cop in Amsterdam.

He was born in Rotterdam on 12 Feb. 1931, raised in Amsterdam, and also lived in Colombia, Peru, and Australia, and in 1975 he settled in a post-and-beam home (with several outbuildings) on 65 acres on the Union River in Surry, Maine.

He attended Delft University (1948), the College for Service Abroad (1949-51), Cambridge University (1951), and the University of London (1957-58).

Although he didn't start publishing until he was in his 40s, Van de Wetering wrote over 35 books, including crime novels featuring two Dutch detectives, children's books, and non-fiction.

He died in 2008.

Selected Bibliography

  • Outsider in Amsterdam (1975)
  • Tumbleweed (1976)
  • The Corpse on the Dike (1976)
  • Death of a Hawker (1977)
  • The Japanese Corpse (1977)
  • The Blond Baboon (1978)
  • The Maine Massacre (1979)
  • The Mind-Murders (1981)
  • Bliss & Bluster (1982)
  • The Butterfly Hunter (1982)
  • The Streetbird (1983)
  • The Safe Feeling
  • Inspector Saito's Small Satori (1985)
  • The Rattle-Rat (1985)
  • Murder By Remote Control (1986)
  • Hard Rain (1986)
  • The Sergeant's Cat (1987)
  • Seesaw Millions (1988)
  • Distant Danger: The 1988 Mystery Writers of America Anthology (1988, editor)
  • Just A Corpse at Twilight (1994)
  • Mangrove Mama...And Other Tropical Tales of Terror (1995)
  • The Hollow-Eyed Angel (1996)
  • The Perfidious Parrot (1997)
  • Judge Dee Plays His Lute: A Play and Selected Mystery Stories (1997/1998)
  • The Amsterdam Cops (1999)

Children's Books

  • Little Owl (1978)
  • Hugh Pine (1980)
  • Hugh Pine and the Good Place (1986)
  • Hugh Pine and Something Else (1989)

Auto/Biographical Works include

  • The Empty Mirror: Experiences in a Japanese Zen Monastery (1973)
  • A Glimpse of Nothingness: Experiences in an American Zen Community (1975)
  • Afterzen: Experiences of a Zen Student Out of His Ear (1999)
  • Robert van Gulik: His Life, His Work (1988),

Selected Links

The Philosophical Exercises of Janwillem van de Wetering (article by Henry Wessells)