William Kent Krueger at a Glance

Full Name: William Kent Krueger

Pronunciation: WIL-yum kent KROO-gur

Born: November 16, 1950

Nationality: United States

Genres:

• Mystery and crime fiction

Biography & Background

William Kent Krueger Biography

William Kent Krueger is an American writer of crime fiction. Although Krueger knew he wanted to be a writer from a young age, his path getting there was not straightforward. Born in Wyoming, he attended Stanford University in California but lost his scholarship after protesting the university’s ties to the Vietnam War. He went on to work a variety of jobs, including logging and freelance journalism, and moved to St. Paul, Minnesota, where he found time to pursue his creative writing in the early morning hours. He published his debut novel, Iron Lake, in 1998.

That novel was also the first in Krueger’s Cork O’Connor series. Set in Minnesota, the series follows a detective of Irish and Anishinaabe heritage and touches on Indigenous history and experience, drawing on Krueger’s longstanding interest in cultural anthropology. He has since published 19 additional books in the series, many of which became New York Times bestsellers (Valeri, John B. “The Dynamism of Growth: William Kent Krueger on Milestones and Making the Familiar Fresh Again.