Koontz, Dean R.

Dean Ray Koontz is an American author of suspense literature. He was born in Everett, Pennsylvania, and grew up in a dysfunctional family with a violent, alcoholic father and a suppressed mother. He found comfort in reading and watching movies, and he began to write short stories, which he sold to friends and relatives when he was eight years old. He attended Shippensburg State College (now Shippensburg University of Pennsylvania) and graduated in 1966 with a degree in English and Communications Science. The same year he married his girlfriend Gerda Ann Cerra.