Jack Ketchum
American Horror Novelist and Recipient of Bram Stoker Award
Jack Ketchum's 1981 debut novel, Off Season, laid the groundwork for a series of novels and short stories in which humankind proves to be the most frightening monster of all. Most notably, his novel Girl Next Door was inspired by the 1965 torture and murder of teenager Sylvia Likens. Caged like an animal, Likens was abused by a neighborhood woman who engaged other teenagers to assist her in the torture and killing of the young girl.
Biography: .
Born in Livingston, New Jersey in 1946, Jack Ketchum (a pseudonym) is the only child of Dallas William Mayr and Evelyn Fahner Mayr. His folks owned a luncheonette and soda fountain which sold groceries as well as magazines, paperback books, newspapers, and comics. Young Dallas would arrange and display the newspapers, magazines and comics. He helped at the family store through his teen years, as a short order cook in the mornings and as a soda jerk at night.
Before becoming a full time writer, he worked as a garbage man, a lumber salesman, a copywriter, editor of the paleontological Magazine "Fossils," and as a literary agent for Scott Meredith, Inc., where he served as agent for author Henry Miller. He worked in theater, first as a drama reviewer, then in new York's off off Broadway. A theater Company produced a few of Ketchum's One act plays (Two of which he directed) in Summer Stock repertory.
Ketchum earned a B.A. in English from Emerson College in Boston, and later taught high school in Brookline, Massachusetts, for two years.
Dallas chose his pseudonym based on the Texan outlaw Thomas "Black Jack" Ketchum (1863- 1901).
Films:
Several of Jack Ketchum's novels have been adapted into film, including The Lost, The Girl Next Door, and Red.
Awards and Honors:
Ketchum has received numerous Bram Stoker awards from the Horror Writers Association for both his novels and short stories, including The Box, Closing Time, Peaceable Kingdom, and Gone.
He has been hailed by Stephen King, who referred to Ketchum as "the scariest Guy in America." His novella The Crossings was cited by Stephen King during a speech delivered at the 2003 National Book Awards. Other critics, such as "The Village Voice." have been less than impressed, referring to Ketchum's work as both violent and pornographic.
One of the characteristics of Ketchum's work that differentiates him from many other horror writers is that he often draws upon actual events as the basis of his novels and stories. The monsters Jack Ketchum's work are perhaps more disturbing because they are not ghouls or demons, human.
To keep up to date on Jack Ketchum's work, interviews and appearances, visit his website.
Jack Ketchum
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