Steve Mandich, 40, first appeared in print when his pen/crayon illustration was published in The Art of Star Wars (Ballantine, 1979); not until the fanzine explosion of the 1990s did he begin his literary career.
Within the photocopied pages of his self-published 'zine Heinous, Steve examined such pop-culture anomalies as the enigmatic Human Fly, the defunct Seattle Pilots baseball team, the fundamentalist comics of Jack Chick, deadpan legend Bob Newhart, and monorails. Heinous was a surprise hit, called a "wickedly enjoyable read" by Utne Reader, and garnering a rave "Editor's Choice" review in Factsheet Five. Select articles were hand-picked by Playboy Advisor Chip Rowe for his anthology The Book of Zines (Owl/Henry Holt, 1997). Rowe interviewed Steve here.
Most notably, Heinous gained praise for its extensive coverage of motorcycle daredevil Evel Knievel, which Steve expanded into Evel Incarnate:The Life and Legend of Evel Knievel (Macmillan, 2000). The definitive biography of the fallen 1970s icon garnered an Editor's Choice citation by Amazon.co.uk, and in 2004 was adapted into a film biography by Mel Gibson's Icon Productions for Turner Network Television. In 2005 he was credited as a "Daredevil Consultant/Historian" for the History Channel documentary Absolute Evel: The Evel Knievel Story, and in 2006 he was interviewed on the CMT program True Grit: Evel Knievel. Upon Knievel's passing in 2007, Steve wrote an obitiaury for Slate.com.
Steve lives in his hometown of Seattle, where he earned a journalism degree from the University of Washington and currently manages an independent video store. His work has also appeared in various other fanzines, local newspapers and blogs, and such books as Bubblegum Music is the Naked Truth (Feral House, 2001). He continues freelance writing and maintaining his personal blog while pondering his next big writing project.
Steve is represented by the Rupert Heath Literary Agency.
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