Horror: The 100 Best Books (47 page)

TAD WILLIAMS (b. 1957) has been a rock 'n' roll singer, a shoe salesman, a talk-show host, an insurance agent, a radio journalist and a commercial artist. Born in California, he grew up in Palo Alto, where he loved reading from an early age. He began writing at the age of 24 and his first novel,
Tailchaser's Song
(1985), became a bestseller. Moving from ginger tomcats to heroic fantasy, he is also the author of the
The Dragonbone Chair
,
Stone of Farewell
and
Green Angel Tower
, the three books in his "Memory, Sorrow and Thorn" trilogy, and
Child of An Ancient City
(with Nina Kiriki Hoffmann).

CHET WILLIAMSON (b. 1948) was born in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. His first short story was published in 1981, since when more than sixty stories have appeared in such magazines as
Playboy
,
The New Yorker
,
Esquire
,
Twilight Zone
,
The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction
,
Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine
and
New Black Mask
, as well as numerous anthologies. Williamson's first novel,
Soulstorm
(1986), was an inventive reworking of the traditional haunted house theme, and he has since published
Ash Wednesday
,
Lowland Rider
,
Dreamthorp
,
McKain's Dilemma
and
Reign
. He lives with his wife and son in Elizabethtown, Pennsylvania.

JACK WILLIAMSON (b. 1908) was born in Arizona and raised in New Mexico, where he still lives. After discovering
Amazing Stories
and being influenced by its 1927 serialization of
The Moon Pool
by A. Merritt, he decided to try writing stories for the magazine. His first published effort, "The Metal Man" (1928), was obviously influenced by Merritt, but over the next couple of decades he produced a prolific amount of SF and fantasy fiction for the pulp magazines, including "Golden Blood" (
Weird Tales
, 1933), "The Reign of Wizardry" (
Unknown
, 1940), and the classic werewolf novel, "Darker Than You Think" (
Unknown
, 1940). Early in his career he began writing his most famous work, the "Legion of Space" series, comprising
The Legion of Space
(1934),
The Cometeers
(1936),
One Against the Legion
(1939) and
Nowhere Near
(1967). Williamson's best-known novel,
The Humanoids
, was published in 1949 and he has collaborated with Frederik Pohl on the "Undersea" and "Starchild" trilogies as well as the 1989 volume,
Land's End
. His recent books include
Lifeburst
,
Firechild
,
Mazeway
and
Beachhead
, and the collection
Into the Eighth Decade
. Since 1960, Williamson has been actively involved in promoting SF as an academic subject, winning the Pilgrim Award in 1973 for his work. In 1976 he was awarded the second Grand Master Nebula.

J. (JERRY) N. WILLIAMSON (b. 1932) was born and lives in Indianapolis, where he and his wife Mary raised six children. Since starting out as a horror writer in 1979, his incredibly prolific output has resulted in nearly forty novels, from publishers such as Dell, Tor and Zebra Books, with colourful titles like
The Evil One
,
Death-Coach
,
Ghost Mansion
,
Horror House
,
The Black School
,
Shadows of Death
,
Babel's Children
,
Hell Storm
,
The Night Seasons
and
The Monastery
. His short fiction is collected in
The Naked Flesh of Feeling
, has appeared in such magazines as
Twilight Zone
,
Fantasy Tales
and
Pulphouse
, and the anthologies
Stalkers I
,
II
and
III
,
Scare Care
,
Under the Fang
,
PsychoPaths 1
and
2
,
Narrow Houses
and
The Year's Best Fantasy and Horror
. Williamson is also the editor of four volumes of the popular
Masques
anthologies and
How To Write Tales of Horror, Fantasy and Science Fiction
. He has also been a contributing editor to various magazines.

COLIN WILSON (b. 1931) was born in Leicester and is at once one of Britain's most respected and controversial literary figures. He left school at the age of sixteen and worked in a variety of jobs until he gained international recognition eight years later with his first book -- an "inquiry into the nature of the sickness of mankind" -- titled
The Outsider
. Since then he has written more than fifty books on a diversity of subjects: psychosexual thrillers (
Ritual in the Dark
,
The Sex Diary of Gerard Sorme
,
Lingard
), non-fiction studies of literary creativity and the paranormal (
The Strength of Dream
,
The Occult
,
Mysteries
,
Poltergeist!
,
The Mammoth Book of the Supernatural
), H.P. Lovecraft-inspired horrors (
The Mind Parasites
,
The Philosopher's Stone
) and straightforward science fiction adventures (
The Space Vampires
(filmed as
Lifeforce
)) and the four-volume
Spider World
series:
The Tower
,
The Delta
,
The Fortress
and
The Magician
), as well as historical fiction, mysteries, spy stories, biographies and works on philosophy, psychology and sexuality.

F. PAUL WILSON (b. 1946) was born and raised in New Jersey, where he misspent his youth playing with matches, poring over E.C. and
Uncle Scrooge
Comics, listening to Chuck Berry and Alan Freed, and watching Soupy Sales and horror movies. (He would sneak off on Saturday afternoons to catch horror double features at the Oritani Theatre in Hackensack, stay up late to watch Zacherly on TV's
Shock Theatre
, and managed to see
King Kong
eleven times in one week on
Million Dollar Movie
). Eventually he learned to read, and even write. His short fiction first saw print in
Startling Mystery Stories
18 in 1971, while he was studying as a medical student, and since then he has appeared in most of the major science fiction and fantasy magazines. He is the author of over a dozen books: five science fiction novels (
Healer
,
Wheels Within Wheels
,
An Enemy of the State
,
Dydeetown World
,
The Tery
), six horror thrillers (
The Keep
,
The Tomb
,
Reborn
,
Reprisal
,
Sibs
,
Nightworld
), a supernatural medical thriller (
The Touch
), and a historical horror novel (
Black Wind
). He wrote one-third of
Night Visions 6
and the novellas
Midnight Mass
and
Pelts
, while his short fiction is collected in
Soft and Others
and
Ad Statum Perspicuum
. Wilson also edited the second Horror Writers of America anthology,
Freak Show
. Close to four million copies of his books are in print in America; he hasn't the faintest idea how many are floating around overseas. Wilson describes the 1983 movie version of
The Keep
as "visually striking but perfectly incomprehensible." He resides at the Jersey Shore with his wife, two daughters, and three cats.

DOUGLAS E. WINTER (b. 1950) is a Washington B.C. lawyer and probably the horror/fantasy genre's premier critic. He is the author of the definitive biography and literary study,
Stephen King: The Art of Darkness
(1984), a history of contemporary horror fiction,
Faces of Fear
(1985), the novella
Splatter: A Cautionary Tale
, and a horror novel in collaboration with Charles L. Grant,
From Parts Unknown
. He is currently working on a biography of Clive Barker. Winter's fiction, criticism and interviews have appeared in books and magazines as diverse as
Gallery
,
Harper's Bazaar
,
Saturday Review
,
Twilight Zone
,
Fantasy Newsletter/Review
,
Midnight
,
Greystone Bay
,
Book of the Dead
,
The Penguin Encyclopedia of Horror and the Supernatural
and
Clive Barker's Shadows in Eden
. He is also the editor of
Shadowings
,
Black Wine
,
Prime Evil
,
Night Visions 5
and
Revelations
. In 1986 he won the World Fantasy Special Award.

GENE WOLFE (b. 1931) was born in Brooklyn, New York, and raised mainly in Houston, Texas. He attended Texas A&M, the University of Houston and Miami University, and today lives with his wife, Rosemary, in Barrington, Illinois. The author of more than a hundred science fiction and fantasy stories, he made his debut with a supernatural thriller, "The Dead Man", published in 1965 in
Sir
magazine. His first book,
Operation Ares
, appeared in 1970, and was followed by
The Fifth Head of Cerberus
(a collection of three linked novellas),
Peace
,
The Devil in a Forest
,
Free Live Free
,
Soldier of the Mist
,
Soldier of Arete
,
There Are Doors
,
Castleview
,
Pandora By Holly Hollander
,
Nightside the Long Sun
,
Castle of Days
and the non-fiction volume,
Letters Home
. His short fiction has been collected in
The Island of Doctor Death and Other Stories and Other Stories
,
Gene Wolfe's Book of Days
,
Storeys from the Old Hotel
(winner of the 1989 World Fantasy Award) and
Endangered Species
. In 1980, the first volume of Wolfe's "The Book of the New Sun" tetralogy was published to major acclaim:
The Shadow of the Torturer
won both the World Fantasy Award and the British Science Fiction Award. The second book,
The Claw of the Conciliator
, won the 1982 Nebula Award, and was followed by
The Sword of the Lictor
and
The Citadel of the Autarch
. A coda to the series,
The Urth of the New Sun
, was published in 1987.

DONALD A. (ALLEN) WOLLHEIM (1914-1990) was born in New York City and together with Forrest J Ackerman and others was one of the leading members of the embryonic science fiction fandom during the 1930s. His first published story was "The Man from Ariel" in
Wonder Stories
(1934), although his fiction didn't appear widely until the following decade. The author of more than twenty books and numerous short stories (often under the pseudonym "David Grinnell"), Wollheim was a professional editor since 1941, with such magazines as
Cosmic Stories
,
Stirring Science Stories
and
The Avon Fantasy Reader
, as well as a multitude of SF anthologies to his credit (including
The Pocket Book of Science Fiction
(1943), the first mass-market SF anthology). After World War II he became the
entire
editorial staff at Avon Books, before starting Ace Books with A.A. Wyn in 1952, where he edited their acclaimed SF list for twenty years. He formed his own highly successful specialist imprint, DAW Books, in 1971, which is still going strong. He was a major editorial influence on the entire SF and fantasy field, and discovered and developed many new writers until suffering a stroke in 1988.

JANE YOLEN (b. 1939) was born in New York City, grew up in Westport, Connecticut, and currently lives with her husband in the small New England town of Hatfield, Massachusetts. The author of more than one hundred fantasy books for both children and adults, her output ranges from picture books (
Owl Moon
,
The Emperor & The Kite
,
An Invitation to the Butterfly Ball
,
Tarn Lin
,
Wings
), to fairy tale collections (
The Girl Who Cried Flowers
,
Merlin's Booke
,
Dragonfield and Other Stories
,
Favorite Folktails from Around the World
), to non-fiction (
Ring Out: A Book of Bells
), to novels (
Cards of Grief
,
Dragon's Blood
, Children of the Wolf
,
The Devil's Arithmetic
,
A Sending of Dragons
), and poetry (
Best Witches
). Her recent volumes include the acclaimed
Sister Light Sister Dark
and its sequel,
White Jena
; the anthologies
Werewolves,
Vampires
and
Things That Go Bump in the Night
(all with Martin H. Greenberg);
The Dragon's Boy
,
Wizard's Hall
, the collection
Dream Weaver
, and the
Xanadu
series of anthologies. Yolen is the recipient of numerous awards, including the World Fantasy Award, the Caldecott Medal, the Christopher Medal, the Mythopoeic Society's award, the 1988 Kerlan Award for attainments in children's literature, and the 1992 Regina Medal, given by the Catholic Library Association, for a continuing body of work in children's literature. For several years she was also editor-in-chief of Jane Yolen Books, an imprint created in 1990 by Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, specializing in fantasy and science fiction books for children and young adults, and she is a past president of the Science Fiction Writers of America.