Jason Dark
German writer

Helmut Rellergerd (born 25 January 1945), known by the pen name Jason Dark, is a prolific author of horror detective fiction in the German language. He is known for creating the long-running dime novel series Geisterjäger John Sinclair, which has been ongoing since 1973 and is released weekly since 1978. As of 2020, the John Sinclair series sold more than 250 million novel copies and over 5 million audio drama units.
His work has been favourably compared to that of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Jason Dark is one of the most read authors in Germany in his genre.
Career
Helmut Rellergerd was born in 1945 in Dahle, the Sauerland and grew up in Dortmund. He wrote his first novel after he had finished school and the Bundeswehr. However, this debut release was rejected by the publishers. The first novel published at Bastei Publishing House was Im Kreuzfeuer des Todesdrachen for the crime series Cliff Corner. In 1973, he wrote the novel Die Nacht des Hexers and created the fictional character John Sinclair.
The public source identifies “Jason Dark” as german writer. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Jason, Dark and German.
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The entry’s evidential value lies in the named roles, institutions and publications that can be tested against primary documentation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 28, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q104029. VIAF identifies the subject as 169365528. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1945, 1973, 1978 and 2020.
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This entry incorporates text from “Jason Dark” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.