Colin Dexter is Britain's most popular writer of crime fiction. Born in 1930 in Stamford, Lincolnshire, England, Dexter earned his B.A. and M.A. degrees at Cambridge University and taught school for many years before turning to writing full time. Dexter is best known for creating the character Inspector Morse, the irascible but lovable detective featured on the PBS television series Mystery. The Inspector Morse series began in 1975 with Last Bus to Woodstock, a novel that established Dexter as a popular author. He won the British Crime Writers' Gold Dagger Award for The Wench is Dead in 1989 and again in 1992 for The Way Through the Woods. His latest Inspector Morse novel is Death Is Now My… Neighbour (1996). He lives in Oxford.