DANIEL SILVA is the former executive producer of CNN's Washington-based public affairs programming, He began his career in journalism in San Francisco. While pursuing a graduate degree in international relations at San Francisco State University, he was hired by United Press International for a temporary assignment during the Democratic National Convention in 1984. After a week, UPI offered him a job. Silva left graduate school and went to work.

After working in San Francisco for a year, Silva was transferred to UPI's foreign desk in Washington, D.C., where he worked for two years. In 1987, he was named Middle East Correspondent and posted in Cairo. He traveled extensively in the region and covered the Iran-Iraq war, terrorism and political conflicts. On assignment in the Persian Gulf, he met his wife, Jamie Gangel, National Correspondent for NBC News "Today." The two were married in 1988, and Silva returned to Washington and went to work for CNN.

Silva and wife have 10-year-old twins, Lily and Nicholas, and live in Georgetown in Washington, D.C. Silva left CNN in June of 1997 to concentrate full time on his writing. He is currently at work on his ninth novel.