Dean Koontz
Dean Koontz was born in Everett, Pennsylvania in 1945. His parents were Ray and Florence Koontz. His father was a very violent alcoholic. Dean says, "I was always in physical fear of my father...my childhood was almost unrelenting terror" (St. James Encyclopedia of Popular Culture). His family life is what caused him to write. It was an escape for him. He didn't get much support from his family. his father didn't read anything he wrote, and both parents discouraged fim from reading and writing. Despite the discouragement he continued to write. He went to school at Shippensburg State College and majored in English, following the advice of one of his high school teachers. After he graduated from college he worked as a high school English teacher until his writing career took off. When Koontz was a senior in college he wrote a short story titled "The Kittens", which he entered in a contest in the "Atlantic Monthly". He won the contest and that was his first work ever published. The first novel that he published was "Star Quest" in 1968. He isn't proud of his earlier works, "both because I was so young and unself-critical and because the low earnings of each book forced me to write a lot of them in order to keep financially afloat" (Contemporary Authors Online). But the public like his works, and he started to become well-known as a science-fiction writer. But over the years he's become a "cross-genre" writer, writing science-fiction, suspense, horror, crime, and gothic novels. His most recent novels have been mostly horror, and the latest of those is "By the Light of the Moon". Koontz has published over 150 works over the past forty years, and his books are read in several different countries. He's well-liked by many different kinds of people, and his books will continue to be read for many years to come.
Links
Demon Seed Review
Intensity Review
Style
Critical Acclaim
