The Chessmen of Doom

John Bellairs (1938–1991) was an American novelist working primarily in the Gothic genre. He is best-known for the children's classic The House with a Clock in its Walls 1973) and for the pathbreaking fantasy novel The Face in the Frost (1969). Bellairs held a bachelor's degree from Notre Dame University and a master's in English from the University of Chicago. He combined writing and teaching from 1963 to 1971, including a year at Shimer College that coincided with that school's storied Grotesque Internecine Struggle. After 1971, he took up writing as his full-time work. (from Shimer College Wiki)