Mario Francis Puzo (October 15, 1920 – July 2, 1999) was an American author and screenwriter. He is best known for his crime novels about the Italian-American Mafia and Sicilian Mafia, most notably The Godfather (1969), which he later co-adapted into a film trilogy directed by Francis Ford Coppola. He received the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay for the first film in 1972 and for Part II in 1974. Puzo also wrote the original screenplay for the 1978 Superman film and its 1980 sequel. His final novel, The Family, was released posthumously in 2001.

Puzo was born into a poor family of Neapolitan immigrants living in the Hell's Kitchen neighborhood of New York. Many of his books draw heavily on this heritage. After graduating from the City College of New York, he joined the United States Army Air Forces in World War II. Due to his poor eyesight, he was made a public relations officer stationed in Germany. In 1950, his first short story, The Last Christmas, was published in American Vanguard. His first book, The Dark Arena, was published in 1955.

During the 1950s and early 1960s, Puzo worked as a writer/editor for Martin Goodman's Magazine Management Company. Puzo left an indelible mark as the chronicler of the mafia, especially with his masterpiece, The Godfather, capturing the essence of mafia life with gritty realism and redefining the crime novel genre. Through his writing, Puzo explored themes of family loyalty, ambition, and corruption.