Frank was born in Chicago in 1908. Frank spent many years as a journalist and information handler for several newspapers, agencies, and government bureaus. During his early career, he lived mainly in New York and Washington (and service overseas during World War II, when he worked for the Office of War Information and was a correspondent in Italy, Austria, Germany, and Turkey). Died 1964 in Jacksonville, Florida, age 57, of acute pancreatitis.

Nearly all men are sterile in Mr. Adam (1946), Frank's first published work. His other novels include Hold Back the Night, An Affair of State, and Forbidden Area. Frank's experiences reporting on the Korean conflict are described in his autobiographical travelogue The Long Way Round and influenced Hold Back the Night.

Frank wrote his most popular work, the post-apocalyptic novel Alas, Babylon, while living in Tangerine, Florida, on Lake Beauclaire near Mount Dora. Vivian Owens, an author familiar with local history, states that "Pistolville," the name Frank gave to an area near Fort Repose in the novel, was in fact a location situated just between the southern edge of Mount Dora to its north and Tangerine to its south. According to Owens, greater Mount Dora was intended by Frank to be the model for his semi-fictional Fort Repose."Alas, Babylon: Mount Dora, Florida." Everything2.com. 18 Oct. 2006. 18 Oct. 2006 .

Frank also authored a 160 page non-fiction book, How To Survive the H Bomb And Why (1962).

Frank received the American Heritage Foundation Award in 1961.