BIO

21 JANUARY 1936 - 5 NOVEMBER 2014

From ATA of various books published while he was still living:

John Gordon Davis was born in what was then Rhodesia of South African parents and educated in South Africa. He became a member of the Seamen's Union and his university vacations were spent at sea, with the Dutch whaling fleet in the Antarctic, and on British merchantmen. He took degrees in political science and law and joined the Rhodesian Civil Service as a public prosecutor, before becoming Crown Counsel. He was then appointed to the same position in Hong Kong. After the success of his first book, Hold My Hand I'm Dying, he left his work, by then as a barrister in Hong Kong, to write for his living. 

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[Before his death] he live[d] with his wife Rosie on a farm in southern Spain for half of every year, while the other half they spen[t] researching future books.

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From blurb of House of Stratus books published after his death:

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John Gordon Davis was born in southern Rhodesia, now Zimbabwe, and educated in South Africa. He earned a BA in Political Science, paying his way through university by working as a deckhand on British merchant ships and on the Dutch whaling fleet at the Antarctic. He went on to take an LL.B. degree in law whilst serving as a judge's clerk in Rhodesia.

Called to the Bar, he was appointed an assistant public prosecutor in the Magistrate's Courts during the troubled years leading up to Rhodesia's Unilateral Declaration of Independence, before becoming Crown Counsel in the Attorney General's Chambers. He was later appointed to the same position in Hong Kong.

He quit this post to become a full-time writer when his first book, Hold My Hand I'm Dying became an instant best-seller. Other best-selling novels followed.

A veteran seaman, he and his Australian born wife, Rosemary, sailed round most of the world in a succession of yachts. Upon retirement, they travelled widely and from their fixed base, a lovely old Spanish farmhouse in Andalucia, Spain, he also ran highly successful writing courses for both aspiring and published authors.

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John Gordon Davis sadly died in 2014 leaving behind a rich literary heritage, including several unpublished novels he had worked on even as he supposedly slowed his pace.