His best-known works are the 1949 comic mystery The Trouble with Harry (which was adapted for Alfred Hitchcock's 1955 film of the same name), the Albert Argyle trilogy (Live Now, Pay Later, Something for Nothing and The Urban District Lover), and his Horace Spurgeon novels (I Sit in Hanger Lane, One Last Mad Embrace, Hitler Needs You).
He was from a working-class background and was essentially self-taught as a writer, basing his approach on that of his idol William Saroyan.
He first achieved success as a genre writer, with the Pinetop Jones Western stories (writing as Bret Harding); he later contributed to the Sexton Blake detective series.
His writing is unpretentious and effective, although it often assumes the reader's sympathies lie with the protagonist even when behaving poorly.
The prize money is given on the condition that "the entire award must be spent 'in a week to a fortnight' and the recipient must have nothing to show for it.
"[4] The conditions echo what Story reportedly said at his second bankruptcy when asked in court where the money from his films had gone: "You know how it is, your honour ‑ two hundred or two thousand ‑ it always lasts a week to a fortnight.
Winners of the Jack Trevor Story Memorial Cup include Fred Normandale, Steve Aylett, Nicholas Lezard[5] and Howard Waldrop.