Born into a Bucharest Jewish family of small craftsmen, his father Nathan Peltz was a tailor, while his mother Estera (née Rotenberg) made linens.
During the interwar period, he had an active newspaper career, also working as an editor at Epoca, Îndreptarea, Lupta, Era nouă, Ordinea, Izbânda and Avântul, and as a contributor for the magazines Sburătorul (sporadically attending the publication's Eugen Lovinescu-led circle), Viața Românească, România Literară, Cuvântul liber, Azi, Șantier, Bilete de Papagal, Vremea, Reporter and Adevărul literar și artistic.
His short prose includes Stafia roșie (1918), Meșterul viață (1919), Paiațele (1921) and Fantoșe vopsite (1924); Peltz returned to the genre under communism, with Inimi zbuciumate (1962), Până într-o zi (1963), Fauna burzuluiților (1965), Instantanee comice – și nu prea... (1967) and Microbar (1971).
His most noted works were his novels, beginning with Viața cu haz și fără a numitului Stan (1929) and Horoscop (1932), but especially Calea Văcărești (1933) and Foc în Hanul cu tei (1934), which showed the full measure of his writing talent, later diluted and marked by aesthetic lapses in "Actele vorbește" (1935), Țară bună (1936), Nopțile domnișoarei Mili (1937) and Pui de lele (1937).
[3] His postwar Israel însângerat (1946), Vadul fetelor (1949) and Max și lumea lui (1957) were unremarkable, but retained their setting within a Jewish milieu, which he barely updated to reflect current realities.