Latest Posts
The Intensity of High Tension: A Look at Plagiarism in Horror
October 7, 2018
In a time of remakes, reboots, re-imaginings and so forth, the genre fan has a narrowed selection in terms of originality. This debatable lack of creativity divides audiences on a regular basis. Whether or not one is a fan of the remake, the idea of proper acknowledgment and credit should never be in question. Intensity is a novel written by Dean Koontz in 1995. A two-part miniseries was produced in 1997 that aired on the Fox network. High Tension is a 2003 French film directed by Alexandre Aja. The first half of all three works have virtually the same plot. Even the titles have a similar ring to them. The problem is that Aja’s film gives zero credit to Koontz’s original work.
Read the full article @ Wicked Horror
What’s New & Updates October 1, 2018
October 1, 2018
Life gets complicated when in one weekend I had a Keb’ Mo’ concert in Wichita, a Henry Rollins show in Lincoln in my personal life, and monthly statistics, and a quarterly report for me day job to compile. Then there’s a manuscript to proof for the umpteenth time, and a book chapter due too. I’m surprised I got this much done.
- Author’s Afterward to Hung!
- Author’s Foreword to The Fall of the Dream Machine
- Author’s Introduction to Night Chills (DRK)
- Author’s Introduction to Night Chills (DK)
- Don Brautigam Artist Portfolio – News regarding forthcoming new copies
- The Funhouse – Revised UK Headline mass market paperback image
- Horror Films of the 1970s Vol. 2 added to Demon Seed (Film)
- Lightning Mass Market Paperback cover image
- The Mississippi Flows Into the Tiber added to Appendix A
- Your Heart Belongs to Me UK Harper mass market paperback image
Don Brautigam Artist Portfolio news
September 29, 2018
It looks like Centipede Press is going to be publishing six, yes, just six, more autographed copies of their Don Brautigam Artist Portfolio. Here’s what the publisher had to say in his September 23, 2018 newsletter:
“Wow! We found six signature pages for our special Don Brautigam art book. They are numbered and signed by Don Brautigam and Dean Koontz. These would be a special run of the book. This is an extremely costly book to make, and the price will likely be well over $1,500, so let me know if you might be interested. As always, thank you for your support and have a great week!”
That’s a pretty penny for one of the six new copies which will bring the total up to 36. No word yet on whether this will be bound the same, or something more creative. Check out the details regarding the first 30 copies over on the Don Brautigam Artist Portfolio entry.
Oh, and you know I put my name on the list for a copy. Now to figure out how I’m going to pay for it.
What’s New & Updates September 24, 2018
September 24, 2018
Yep, three-day weekend, but circumstances ended up keeping me away from the site for most of it. But i do have one update for you.
- The Forbidden Door Barnes & Noble /Books-A-Million Signed Edition
- Midnight updated mass market paperback image
Whats new & updated September 16, 2018
September 16, 2018
Due to work-related schedule needs I have just a one-day weekend this week so there’s not much to announce. However, in exchange I get a three-day weekend next week so hopefully next week’s update list will be much longer.
- The Bad Place (Cassette)
- The Forbidden Door
The Transcendent Dean Koontz
September 15, 2018
To take a wider view, Koontz is presenting in the series a large-scale defense of the ability to choose meaning and virtue. One of his recurring characters is an anxiety-prone latter-day Puritan, while another is an intellectually and physically domineering hulkstraight out of a Max Weber tract. Koontz fairly and logically shows the necessary consequences of these characters’ thoughts and actions by creating storylines of such accessibility that the general reader can see how their ideologies contradict any coherent notion of the good life. The modern Puritan, for instance, moves nervously from scene to scene, constantly seeking perfection and never finding it, unjustly critiquing others while placating his own ego. The ideologies Koontz critiques inevitably lead to disaster — not just for the characters, but for the societies built on such chimeras.
Hawk, on the other hand, embraces the natural religion to which Koontz’s wide fan base responds with awe. She finds solace in the wonder of creation while calling out evil for its supernatural maliciousness, ever uniting reason with hope against secular hedonism. Koontz does “diversity” the right way, too: He features an autistic character in this series who is a compelling hero because he faces down his particular suffering by accepting grace. And as Flannery O’Connor and Léon Bloy before her have shockingly reminded us, the reception of grace usually hurts — badly.
Read the full article online @ NationalReview.com
The Night Window now available for pre-order
September 13, 2018
Amazon.com has The Night Window (Jane Hawk #5) up for pre-order with a release date of May 14, 2019.
Groundbreaking, wholly involving, eerily prescient and terrifyingly topical, Dean Koontz’s Jane Hawk series sets a new standard for contemporary thrillers. Since her sensational debut in The Silent Corner, readers have been riveted by Jane Hawk’s resolute quest to take down the influential architects of an accelerating operation to control every level of society via an army of mind-altered citizens. At first, only Jane stood against the “Arcadian” conspirators, but slowly others have emerged to stand with her, even as there are troubling signs that the “adjusted” people are beginning to spin viciously out of control. Now, in the thrilling, climactic showdown that will decide America’s future, Jane will require all her resources–and more–as she confronts those at the malevolent, impregnable center of power.
The Forbidden Door has hit the streets
September 12, 2018
The Forbidden Door was released yesterday and it’s page is as up to date as it can be. As soon as my Books-a-Million & Barnes & Noble pre-signed editions arrive they’ll be added quickly. Otherwise, here’s a few odds & ends from round the Web.
Available today! Get your copy here: https://t.co/5EDMTwq1bo
#JaneHawk #TheForbiddenDoor pic.twitter.com/vM6tNpB1SO— Dean Koontz (@deankoontz) September 11, 2018
“Jane Hawk is arguably the best character Koontz has created.”—@AP
Relentless rogue FBI agent Jane Hawk returns in THE FORBIDDEN DOOR by @deankoontz! Out today: https://t.co/D1jBweOKqW pic.twitter.com/e5pPww5she— Random House (@randomhouse) September 11, 2018
Whats new & updated September 10, 2018
September 10, 2018
This week gets us a lot of author’s notes in various titles along with a few other odds & ends.
- Afterword to Winesburg, Ohio by Sherwood Anderson
- “Author’s Introduction” (Night Chills)
- “Author’s Note” (Fear Nothing)
- “Author’s Note” (The Forbidden Door)
- “Author’s Note” (From the Corner of His Eye)
- “Author’s Note” (Hung!)
- “Author’s Note” (One Door Away From Heaven)
- “Author’s Note” (Shattered)
- By the Light of the Moon CD – cover image and updated details
- The Servants of Twilight – Library Edition CD image (See FAQ for more details on library editions.)
Whats new & updated September 4, 2018
August 31, 2018
As you can see, this past week was extremely productive. The three-day weekend definitely helped. Enjoy.
- After the Last Race (fixed publication order)
- “Altarboy”
- Anti-Man
- “Anton Yelchin”
- Ashley Bell
- “Ashley Bell: The Sneaky Author’s Intentions”
- Ask Anna: Advice for the Furry and Forlorn
- The Bad Place by Dean R. Koontz
- The Bad Place by Dean Koontz
- The Bad Place screenplay
- “Batista’s Hole in the Wall”
- Beastchild (novella)
- Beastchild (novel)
- Beastchild – Preferred Text
- “Best books…chosen by Dean Koontz”
- “Beautiful Death”
- Big Little Life: A Memoir of a Joyful Dog
- “Big News, Little News”
- “The Black Pumpkin” by Dean R. Koontz
- “The Black Pumpkin” by Dean Koontz
- Black River
- Black River (TV)
- Black River: I’ll Be Watching Over You
- “Blame Jane Hawk”
- Bliss to You: Trixie’s Guide to a Happy Life
- Blood Risk
- “Bob Hoskins: An Appreciation”
- “Body of Work”
- The Book of Counted Joys in Appendix C
- “The Book of Counted Sorrows: A Further Explanation from Uncle Dean”
- Bounce Girl
- Breathless
- A Brief History of Canine Advice
- Bubbles
- Busy Dean
- By the Light of the Moon
- Chase as by K.R. Dwyer
- Chase by Dean R. Koontz
- UK editions of Chase – Revised Edition
- The Crooked Staircase PPBK
- “Dogs Just Want to Have Fun”
- The Edgeway Crisis – Updated author & details
- “Eight Things Elsa Wants You to Know about Dad’s New Book, THE FORBIDDEN DOOR”
- Esquire, July 2009 on the Relentless page
- “Hawk’s Way” in Useless News
- “Illusion, Truth, and the Whole Damn Thing” in Useless News (again)
- Useless News – Autumn 2018
The Great American Read: Q&A with Dean Koontz
August 31, 2018
Dean Koontz, author of The Watchers, answers a few questions from The Great American Read:
When you’re in a book store, what section do you gravitate to and why?
The fiction section. As a child growing up in poverty and violence, I read fiction not merely to escape that environment, but also to learn how other people lived——and how best to live my life. I have learned more that’s true about life from reading well-crafted fiction than I’ve found in most nonfiction. Besides, writing fiction has given my life meaning!
Read the full interview @ the Great American Read.
Useless News Autumn 2018 issue out
August 30, 2018
Received my copy today.
The Crooked Staircase premium paperback out today
August 28, 2018
What’s new & updated August 27, 2018
August 27, 2018
Today yard work and cleaning out the gutters got the best of me so there’s not much to announce.
The Bad Place proof available on eBay
August 26, 2018
Not something you see every day. (Not my listing.)
What’s New & Updated August 20, 2018
August 20, 2018
It’s not every week I get to add a newly published work. It’s even rarer that I get to post something previously unknown. This week I got to do both!
- Cold Fire by Dean R. Koontz
- Cold Fire by Dean Koontz
- Darkest Desires: The Makani Trilogy (and all relevant cross-references)
- Demon Child by Dean Koontz
- Darkness Comes 1st paperback edition image and details.
- Esquire, December 2001 to the notes for From the Corner of His Eye
- The Good Guy updated LP HC image
- Ogleton Chronicles to Appendix C
- Shadowfires LP HC image and details
- “Troubled Times”
Reused cover art
August 20, 2018
The same are being used on books by different authors fascinates me. Here’s my latest find.
Discovering “Ogleton Chronicles”
August 19, 2018
Today I discovered, care of the Twitter account of writer B. Clay Moore, that back in 2009 there was going to be a comic book series developed by Dean titled “Ogleton Chronicles.” Here’s all the information I have at this time along with two unpublished pages. More to follow if/when I have more. (An entry in Appendix C will also be created.)
Here’s a weird thing from the past I found in my email. Jim Muniz pages from a collaboration we were once supposed to do with Dean Koontz, of all people.
This one never happened. pic.twitter.com/3JUld1xz9Q
— B. Clay Moore (@bclaymoore) August 19, 2018
It was a proposed original comic book called the Ogleton Chronicles. I wrote the first issue and it sort of faded away. 2009, I think.
— B. Clay Moore (@bclaymoore) August 19, 2018
Koontz created the concept
— B. Clay Moore (@bclaymoore) August 19, 2018
100 Best Thrillers of All Time
August 18, 2018
You’ve probably binge-watched all the top thriller movies out now on Netflix, Amazon Prime, and Hulu, but have you read the best thriller books of all time?
In 2018, we’re presenting our take on the 100 best thrillers of all time, spanning the best psychological thrillers, crime novels, and mysteries. Of course, we know that this list doesn’t cover every top-notch thriller out there, so let us know in the comments what suspense novels are your all-time favorites.
…
Strangers
Dean Koontz
After over two decades in the trenches of sci-fi and horror fiction, Koontz earned his first hardcover bestseller with 1986’s Strangers, which revolves around a band of individuals who find themselves drawn to a motel in the Nevada desert from thousands of miles apart, united in an escalating sense of terror which manifests differently in each of them. This page-turner signifies the moment when Koontz announced himself to the mainstream as an indisputable authority on the art of building suspense.
– Tom
Source: Signature: 100 Best Thrillers of All Time
100 Best Horror Novels And Stories : NPR
August 17, 2018
Who doesn’t love a good scary story, something to send a chill across your skin in the middle of summer’s heat? And this year, we’re celebrating the 200th birthday of one of the most famous scary stories of all time: Frankenstein — so a few months ago, we asked you to nominate your favorite horror novels and stories, and then we assembled an expert panel of judges to take your 7000 nominations and turn them into a final, curated list of 100 spine-tingling favorites for all kinds of readers. Want to scar your children for life? We can help. Want to dig into the dark, slimy roots of horror? We’ve got you covered.SUMMER READER POLL 2018: HORRORIt’s Aliiiiiive! This Year, Our Summer Reader Poll Is All About HorrorSUMMER READER POLL 2018: HORRORSummer Horror Poll: Meet Our Expert Panelists!SUMMER READER POLL 2018: HORRORH. P. Lovecraft And The Shadow Over Horror.
As with our other reader polls, this isn’t meant to be a ranked or comprehensive list — there are a few books you won’t see on it despite their popularity — some didn’t stand the test of time, some just didn’t catch our readers’ interest, and in some cases our judges would prefer you see the movie instead. (So no Jaws, sorry.) And there are a few titles that aren’t strictly horror, but at least have a toe in the dark water, or are commenting about horrific things, so our judges felt they deserved a place on the list.