[b]William Craig[/b] (1929-1997) was an American historian and novelist. Born and raised in Concord, Massachusetts, he interrupted his career as an advertising salesman to appear on the quiz show Tic-Tac-Dough in 1958. With his $42,000 in winnings-a record-breaking amount at the time-Craig enrolled at Columbia University and earned both an undergraduate and a master's degree in history. He published his first book, [i]The Fall of Japan[/i], in 1967. A narrative history of the final weeks of World War II in the Pacific, it reached the top ten on the [i]New York Times[/i] bestseller list and was deemed "virtually flawless" by the [i]New York Times[/i] Book Review. In order to write [i]Enemy at the Gates[/i] (1973), a documentary account of the Battle of Stalingrad, Craig travelled to three continents and interviewed hundreds of military and civilian survivors. A [i]New York Times[/i] bestseller, the book inspired a film of the same name starring Jude Law and Joseph Fiennes. In addition to his histories of World War II, Craig wrote two acclaimed espionage thrillers: [i]The Tashkent Crisis[/i] (1971) and [i]The Strasbourg Legacy[/i] (1975).