He had his first publication in the New York Times at 20. He completed his first novel (a sci-fi), aged 13, and produced his first play when he was 19. Hobbs begun his writing career at a young age. Rachel Rayner, commissioning editor at Transworld Publishers, wrote for The Bookseller in 2013 that 'it’s clear that Roger has an incredible future ahead', after the success of his debut that also secured him a film deal with Warner Bros. In 2015, he became the youngest person ever to win the Maltese Falcon award. In 2014, he won the Strand Critics award and was nominated for the Edgar, Barry, and Anthony awards. As well as winning the award for the best thriller of 2013, he was longlisted for a John Creasey Award for Best First Novel that year. Hobbs' debut Ghostman, he wrote during his senior year of college, made him the youngest person ever to win a CWA Ian Fleming Steel Dagger. And as his friend I'm doubly devastated.'īill Scott-Kerr, publisher at Transworld, said of Hobbs it was 'too upsetting to contemplate what he might have gone on to achieve', as 'a new shining talent on the crime writing scene'. Roger accomplished so much as a writer in so little time, and his future was sure to be extraordinary in ways we'll now never know. Gary Fisketjon, Hobbs' editor at Knopf, said in a statement: 'It is is a shocking, tragic loss. American thriller writer Roger Hobbs, author of Ghostman and Vanishing Games (Transworld), has died, aged 28, after an overdose.

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