Lynn Kostoff was born in Moultrie, Georgia and raised in Northeastern Ohio. He attended Bowling Green State University for both his undergraduate and graduate degrees. Along the way to becoming a crime writer and English professor, he worked as a truck farmer, gardener, janitor, hospital orderly, and steel mill laborer. He has taught at Indiana State University and the University of Alabama and is retired from Francis Marion University in Florence, South Carolina where he was the Writer‐in‐Residence.