[2] An American author of Irish ancestry visiting Ireland for the first time is the main character in Cast a Cold Eye.
Encouraged by Charles L. Grant as well as his friends Thomas Monteleone and Jill Bauman, Ryan wound up selling his first paperback original, Panther!, on proposal for $6000.
He returned in 2011 with a new novel, Amazonas, which came out after his death of pancreatic cancer at the age of 68 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, where he lived.
Ryan was a prolific horror author and also a respected editor, with notable anthologies including World Fantasy Award nominees Perpetual Light (1982) and Night Visions: In the Blood (1984, first in the Night Visions series published by Berkley and later Subterranean Press).
These anthologies feature works from authors like Charles L. Grant, Robert Silverberg and Brian Aldiss.