John Richard Hersey was born on June 17, 1914 in Tientsin, China. He was an
American writer and journalist. He brings a journalist's style
to his more than twenty novels.
A Bell for Adano was written in 1944 and was Hersey's first novel. It won the Pulitzer
Prize for the Novel in 1945. It was made into a movie of the same name starring
John Hodiak and Gene Tierney. A review by the Vancouver Public Library stated
that A Bell for Adano is ". . . a classic war novel. The book is rich in characterization,
and it is recognized as a classic study in leadership. Another possible reason it was so
well received was that the novel portrays the American army in a positive light and
shows how democracy is inherently superior to Fascism."