Dean Koontz

Dean Ray Koontz ( born July 9, 1945 in Everett, Pennsylvania) is an American writer. He is considered one of the most successful American writers in the field of fantastic literature of the present.

• 2.1 style
• 2.2 pseudonyms 2.2.1 Leigh Nichols

Biography

Childhood

Dean Koontz was born on 9 July 1945 as the son of Ray and Florence ( Molly ). He grew up in very poor circumstances and was ( like his mother) abused by his alcohol -addicted father. Beautiful memories of his childhood arise almost exclusively to the books he has devoured literally. At the age of eight he already wrote his first short stories. To supplement his pocket money, he sold them to neighbors and relatives.

In school, he was very lazy and did only the bare necessities. If anything, however, sparked his interest, he also wrote good grades. In addition, he was considered a class clown.

Study time

At the age of 20 years ( 1965) he won his first prize in a writing contest a newspaper. In the same year he sold for the first time a short story to a professional publisher. The story was titled kitten and should remain the only sale during his college years. In 1966 he married his wife Gerda.

Initial phase

After graduating college Dean Koontz Although regularly sold short stories, but he deserved it as good as anything and not managed to escape the poverty. However, he did not give up writing, because it gave him a lot of fun and quickly became an important part of his life.

For one year he worked as a teacher for underprivileged children. To allow Gerda, gave their location on as an accountant and worked in a shoe factory on the assembly line, where they earned more thanks to the chord salary. When the year was over, Koontz took a job as an English teacher at a high school in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania. Gerda worked as a receptionist in a company for business articles.

Besides, Koontz still sold short stories and novels in paperback publishers. His first experience was frustrating. Even with his first novel publication he was pulled from the publisher ( Ace Books ) on the table. It was a story called Space Quest and appeared in a double band together with the novel of another writer ( only years later learned Koontz, that they had received both too little advance ). More science fiction paperbacks Koontz were published by Ace Books, until he got in trouble with the accounts of the publisher. The reported sales figures were obviously not right.

Dean Koontz made ​​many unpleasant experiences. The publishers forced him to change the titles of his books ( for example, of "The Mystery of his Flesh" to completely incoherent "Anti -Man " ), changed the content from without consultation, paid too little money, etc. As Koontz learned that these poor treatment of the authors at that time was typical for the area science fiction, he turned his back on the genre (without this decision in his own words ever regretted to have ). Since the name Dean Koontz was still standing in the context of science fiction, he lay pseudonyms to: KR Dwyer from the publisher Random House, Brian Coffey at Bobbs- Merrill and later by Doubleday. Only when Anteneum he wrote again under his real name - a blend of suspense fiction, detective fiction, science fiction, horror and love story. He tried consciously to do with the mixing of different genres within the mainstream literature something new.

The success

After the difficult early stages he came in 1981 with " Whispers in the Night " ( Night Whispers ) for the first time on the bestseller list of the New York Times (by now he was ten hardcover and twelve paperbacks at # 1 - only a dozen other authors have achieved so far ). But it took years for the publishers granted him total freedom. Only when "Dark Rivers of the Heart" ( Dark Rivers of the Heart, 1994), one title was used, which he had first proposed ( "Dragon Tears " (1993) was a compromise - although the title came from Koontz, but he wanted the book originally Tick Tock call ).

Miscellaneous

Style

Dean Koontz is extremely versatile. Sometimes his books Science Fiction, sometimes more horror, thriller or fantasy, and often a mixture thereof. When his first success ( whisper in the night ) simply stamped in wide circles only as a horror, Koontz was disappointed and could not understand it - because the book lacks many horror typical properties. It includes, for example, no supernatural elements and is not particularly bloody.

Koontz main principle: the book must make so during the graphic that it takes the buyer 's hand, it is his job as a writer to capture the reader simultaneously with the very first sentence of the book so that he no longer wants to put away. This stands in stark contrast to the style of writing of Stephen King, the voltage slowly and subtly builds in his books and spends a lot of time for it to illuminate in detail the character of a people. The typical Koontz book begins with the fact that he puts his main character in front of a hopeless situation or extreme. In fact, usually implies the first sentence of that same something exciting will happen.

Koontz books contain extremely many elements of tension and go quickly in the narrative forward. Koontz fans will love this, while other readers miss the detailed and extensive description of the characters.

In many Koontz books one of the main characters had a difficult childhood and was abused by an alcoholic addicted parent. Most of these figures have but then still made ​​professional career.

Pseudonyms

The publishers were initially sure Koontz would confuse readers with its genre - confusion. Therefore his quota has been massively expanded to pseudonyms. He wrote as " Leigh Nichols ", " Brian Coffey ", " K. R. Dwyer "," Deanna Dwyer "," Owen West " and" David Axton ". Under each name a particular style should be summarized. But since every single book already contained many styles that never wanted to really succeed. Once Koontz under his real name had enough success, he threw this mess overboard and also the new editions of old novels were published immediately at Dean R. Koontz.

Leigh Nichols

Originally published under Leigh Nichols are:

• Key to Darkness (The Key to Midnight, 1979)
• The Eyes of Darkness (The Eyes of Darkness, 1981)
• House of Fear ( House of Thunder, 1982)
• Death Dawn ( The Servants of Twilight, 1984)
• Door into Darkness ( The Door to December, 1987 -. Only UK version U.S. edition appeared in 1985 in " Richard Paige " )
• Shadowflame ( Shadow Fires, 1987)

Operation

Dean Koontz is a workaholic. He works up to 14 hours a day, between 70 and 80 hours per week. In his house he has a library with about 30,000 books for research. Still it's not self-centered or loners. He likes socializing and is very happy with his fellows together. In fact, it is a burden to him that the books - writing is a passion that so encapsulates him from the outside world. But he says that after ten or eleven hours Average work develops a very special feeling for his characters and literally immersed in their world, which of course benefits the book and thus the reader.

Supplementary information

His works have been translated into 38 languages ​​. Approximately 17 million Koontz books sold per year.

Dean Koontz lives with his wife, Gerda Koontz at the Orange County, California.

Bibliography

Films

Some of his books have been made ​​into a film - but he was always dissatisfied with the results. The implementation of "Hideaway" as more heavily on the original book that Koontz wanted to have his name removed from the credits. He offered the producers to even refund the money for the film rights, if they properly entrusted to his request.

The film rights to "Night of Magic Animals " acquired the Warner Brothers Studios. The plan was to entrust the Tim Burton film and Koontz was excited about it. But Burton refused, and Koontz looked again confronted with the fear that it would change his story strong. To prevent mutilation, he went in an unusual trade: He offered Warner Brothers, a book of short stories ( " Strange Highways - Highway in the Dark " ), including the publishing rights - just about the film rights of 'Night of Magic Animals " recover.

In the film version of " disaster on the city" ( Phantoms with Ben Affleck, Peter O'Toole and others), he finally wrote the screenplay yourself to ensure a faithful book adaptation.

In 1998, the thriller Mr. Murder was - He will find you ... published with Stephen Baldwin and James Coburn.

The film adaptation of Frankenstein - The face O: ( Frankenstein, USA 2004 ) was called in German Frankenstein - The experiment continues. Dean Koontz and producer Martin Scorsese had originally planned a mini-series that never came about. This is also the reason that the atmospherically styled, visually compelling film by Marcus Nispel pilot at the end leaves open some questions.