The Slender Thread

by Stirling Silliphant

Signet D2865 stated First Printing February 1966. Softcover 128 pages.

210 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published January 1, 1966

About the author

Stirling Dale Silliphant was an American novelist, screenwriter and producer. He was born in Detroit, Michigan, moved to Glendale, California as a child, graduated from Hoover High School, and educated at the University of Southern California. He is probably best known for his screenplay adaptations of In the Heat of the Night (which earned him an Oscar for screenplay adaptation)and Charly, which was adapted from Flowers for Algernon and co-creating the television series Route 66.

Other features as screenwriter include Irwin Allen productions
The Towering Inferno and The Poseidon Adventure, adapting both films from previously published novels into one cohesive screenplay each.

In the seventies, the quality of the projects he worked on began to slip, even though they did well at the box office. He wrote the screenplays for The Poseidon Adventure (1972), Shaft in Africa (1973), The Towering Inferno (1974) and The Swarm (1978).

During the 1980's he moved to Thailand, but continued to write for TV movies and mini-series up to his death. His last work was a screenplay for The Grass Harp (1995), which he also co-produced. He died of prostate cancer in Bangkok, Thailand, on April 26, 1996.