Janwillem Lincoln van de Wetering (1931 - 2008)

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

Van de Wetering has 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 has also lived in Colombia, Peru, and Australia, and since 1975 he's settled in a post-and-beam home (with several outbuildings) on 65 acres on the Union River in Surry, Maine, with his wife Juanita, an artist. He attended Delft University (1948), the College for Service Abroad (1949-51), Cambridge University (1951), and the University of London (1957-58). For more about Van de Wetering, this site offers a detailed biography, bibliography (including books in print), and photos, and an interesting short article on Van de Wetering's "Zen detectives" from Eye.Net. A lengthy essay titled 'The Philosophical Exercises of Janwillem van de Wetering' by Henry Wessells offers much background of the writer. van de Wetering was interviewed on the NPR program 'Fresh Air' in Jan. 1997.

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

Van de Wetering's crime novels and collections include:

• 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), in which the accidental death of his brother-in-law sends Grijpstra--with his companion de Gier in tow -- to Jamestown, Maine, where they find a town full of suspects and a series of shady real-estate deals.
• 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; eight short stories involving the his Dutch detective series characters and six other short stories)
• Seesaw Millions (1988)
• Distant Danger: The 1988 Mystery Writers of America Anthology (1988, editor)
• Just A Corpse at Twilight (1994), set in Maine
• Mangrove Mama...And Other Tropical Tales of Terror
• 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), a collection of the 13 short stories about Amsterdam detectives Grijpstra and de Gier
• Shootout at Jackass Junction (due out)

His children's books include Little Owl (1978; about Buddhism), Hugh Pine (1980; Hugh Pine is a porcupine), Hugh Pine and the Good Place (1986), and 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; 1999), Afterzen: Experiences of a Zen Student Out of His Ear (1999/2001), and Robert van Gulik: His Life, His Work (1988), a biography of the Dutch diplomat, orientalist, and novelist.

van de Wetering's article, 'The Way Life Should Be', in the 1 Sept. 2003 issue of The Nation, is about Maine and it's online.


Last Update: 07/15/2008

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