Scott Bechtel Smith (born July 13, 1965) is an American author and

screenwriter A screenplay writer (also called screenwriter, scriptwriter, scribe or scenarist) is a writer who practices the craft of screenwriting, writing screenplays on which mass media, such as films, television programs and video games, are based. ...

. He has written two novels, '' A Simple Plan'' (1993) and '' The Ruins'' (2006). Both were adapted into films - '' A Simple Plan'' (1998) and '' The Ruins'' (2008), respectively - based on Smith's own screenplays. He also wrote the screenplays for the films ''

Siberia Siberia ( ; rus, Сибирь, r=Sibir', p=sʲɪˈbʲirʲ, a=Ru-Сибирь.ogg) is an extensive geographical region, constituting all of North Asia, from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east. It has been a part ...

'' (2018) and '' The Burnt Orange Heresy'' (2019). His screenplay for ''A Simple Plan'' earned him a nomination for the

Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay The Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay is the Academy Award for the best screenplay Film adaptation, adapted from previously established material. The most frequently adapted media are novels, but other adapted narrative formats include st ...

Early life and education

Smith was born in

Summit, New Jersey Summit is a city in Union County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. The city is located on a ridge in northern-central New Jersey, within the Raritan Valley and Rahway Valley regions in the New York metropolitan area. At the 2010 United State ...

in 1965 and moved to

Toledo, Ohio Toledo ( ) is a city in and the county seat of Lucas County, Ohio, United States. A major Midwestern United States port city, Toledo is the fourth-most populous city in the state of Ohio, after Columbus, Ohio, Columbus, Cleveland, and Cincinnat ...

as a child. He is the son of Linda and Doug Smith. He told the ''

Pittsburgh Tribune-Review The ''Pittsburgh Tribune-Review'', also known as "the Trib," is the second largest daily newspaper serving metropolitan Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in the United States. Although it transitioned to an all-digital format on December 1, 2016, it rema ...

'' reviewer Regis Behe that, as a child, he read his father's "castoffs," the novels of

Clive Cussler Clive Eric Cussler (July 15, 1931 – February 24, 2020) was an American adventure novelist and underwater explorer. His thriller novels, many featuring the character Dirk Pitt, have reached ''The New York Times'' fiction best-seller list ...

and

Jack Higgins Henry "Harry" Patterson (27 July 1929 – 9 April 2022), commonly known by his pen name Jack Higgins, was a British author. He was a best-selling author of popular thrillers and espionage novels. His novel '' The Eagle Has Landed'' (1975) so ...

. "Growing up, I also read

Ray Bradbury Ray Douglas Bradbury (; August 22, 1920June 5, 2012) was an American author and screenwriter. One of the most celebrated 20th-century American writers, he worked in a variety of modes, including fantasy, science fiction, horror, mystery, and ...

and

Stephen King Stephen Edwin King (born September 21, 1947) is an American author of horror, supernatural fiction, suspense, crime, science-fiction, and fantasy novels. Described as the "King of Horror", a play on his surname and a reference to his high s ...

," he said. "I just had a sense of how to create these places that aren't real world places, but just with this provisional attachment to the real world. It is very much of your imagination, and I felt very much I could do that." After graduating from

Dartmouth College Dartmouth College (; ) is a private research university in Hanover, New Hampshire. Established in 1769 by Eleazar Wheelock, it is one of the nine colonial colleges chartered before the American Revolution. Although founded to educate Native ...

and from

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...

with a

Master of Fine Arts A Master of Fine Arts (MFA or M.F.A.) is a terminal degree in fine arts, including visual arts, creative writing, graphic design, photography, filmmaking, dance, theatre, other performing arts and in some cases, theatre management or arts ...

degree in Writing, he took up writing full-time.

Career

He has published two novels, '' A Simple Plan'' and '' The Ruins''. His screen adaptation of ''A Simple Plan'' earned him an

Academy Award The Academy Awards, better known as the Oscars, are awards for artistic and technical merit for the American and international film industry. The awards are regarded by many as the most prestigious, significant awards in the entertainment ind ...

nomination. The screenplay won a Broadcast Film Critics Association Award and a National Board of Review Award. His second novel, ''The Ruins'', was also adapted into a film, released on April 4, 2008.

called it "the best horror novel of the new century." King had also called ''A Simple Plan'' "simply the best suspense novel of the year." In 2016 it was announced that

TNT Trinitrotoluene (), more commonly known as TNT, more specifically 2,4,6-trinitrotoluene, and by its preferred IUPAC name 2-methyl-1,3,5-trinitrobenzene, is a chemical compound with the formula C6H2(NO2)3CH3. TNT is occasionally used as a reagen ...

had greenlit a pilot for ''Civil'', a new TV series created by Smith about a

second American Civil War The "Second American Civil War" is an umbrella term used by academics in order to reclassify historical eras of significant political violence in the history of the United States as a "civil war" or, more commonly, to discuss the potential outbr ...

following a hotly contested presidential election. A TV series adaptation of

William Gibson William Ford Gibson (born March 17, 1948) is an American-Canadian speculative fiction writer and essayist widely credited with pioneering the science fiction subgenre known as ''cyberpunk''. Beginning his writing career in the late 1970s, hi ...

's ''

The Peripheral ''The Peripheral'' is a 2014 science fiction mystery-thriller novel by William Gibson set in near- and post-apocalyptic versions of the future. The story focuses on a young rural-town American woman who lives in the near future, and on a London ...

'' was commissioned in 2018 by

Amazon Amazon most often refers to: * Amazons, a tribe of female warriors in Greek mythology * Amazon rainforest, a rainforest covering most of the Amazon basin * Amazon River, in South America * Amazon (company), an American multinational technolog ...

, with Smith as writer. Smith created the series, and served as executive producer and

showrunner A showrunner (or colloquially a helmer) is the top-level executive producer of a television series production who has creative and management authority through combining the responsibilities of employer and, in comedy or dramas, typically also the ...

Vincenzo Natali Vincenzo Natali (born 1969) is an American-born Canadian film director and screenwriter, known for writing and directing science fiction and horror films such as '' Cube'', ''Cypher'', '' Nothing'', and '' Splice''. Early life and education Nat ...

directed the show's pilot.

Bibliography

Novels

*'' A Simple Plan'' (1993), *'' The Ruins'' (2006),

Short stories

* "The Egg Man," Open City Magazine, Issue #20 (2005) * "Up in Old Vermont", originally published in ''Seize the Night: New Tales of Vampiric Terror'' (2015) by

Gallery Books Gallery Publishing Group is a general interest publisher and a division of Simon & Schuster which houses the imprints Gallery Books, Pocket Books, Scout Press, Gallery 13, and Saga Press. Jen Bergstrom is the Senior Vice President and Publisher. ...

, edited by

Christopher Golden Christopher Golden (born July 15, 1967) is an American author of horror, fantasy, and suspense novels for adults and teens. Early life Golden was born and raised in Massachusetts, where he still lives with his family. He graduated from Tufts ...

* "Dogs", originally published in ''Dark Cities'' (2017) by

Titan Books Titan Publishing Group is the publishing division of Titan Entertainment Group, which was established in 1981. The books division has two main areas of publishing: film and television tie-ins and cinema reference books; and graphic novels and c ...

, edited by Christopher Golden * "Christmas in Barcelona", originally published in ''Hark! The Herald Angels Scream'' (2018) by

Anchor Books Vintage Books is a trade paperback publishing imprint of Penguin Random House originally established by Alfred A. Knopf in 1954. The company was purchased by Random House in April 1960, and a British division was set up in 1990. After Random Hou ...

, edited by Christopher Golden

Translations

*Italian by Mario Biondi, "Un piano semplice", Rizzoli, 1993 *Slovakian (by Katarína Jusková): ''Ruiny''. - Bratislava: Ikar 2006. *Spanish by Jaume Subira Ciurana, "Las Ruinas", Ediciones B, Barcelona 2007. *Swedish by Olov Hyllienmark "Ruinerna" *Danish by Henrik Enemark Sørensen *Polish by Jan Kraśko - "Prosty Plan" *Spanish by Rosa Corgatelli "Un plan simple"

Filmography

Film * '' A Simple Plan'' (1998) * '' The Ruins'' (2008) * ''

'' (2018) * '' The Burnt Orange Heresy'' (2019) Television * ''

'' (2022)

References

External links

*
Online interview from CBC Words at Large

{{DEFAULTSORT:Smith, Scott 1965 births 20th-century American novelists 21st-century American novelists American male novelists American male screenwriters Columbia University School of the Arts alumni Dartmouth College alumni Living people Writers from Summit, New Jersey 20th-century American male writers 21st-century American male writers Novelists from New Jersey Screenwriters from New Jersey