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Peter Straub

Goodreads author profile

born

March 02, 1943 in Milwaukee Wisconsin, The United States

gender

male

website

http://www.peterstraub.net/

genre

Mystery & Thrillers, Horror, Literature & Fiction

member since

February 2007

About this author

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Peter Straub was born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin on 2 March, 1943, the first of three sons of a salesman and a nurse. The salesman wanted him to become an athlete, the nurse thought he would do well as either a doctor or a Lutheran minister, but all he wanted to do was to learn to read.

When kindergarten turned out to be a stupefyingly banal disappointment devoted to cutting animal shapes out of heavy colored paper, he took matters into his own hands and taught himself to read by memorizing his comic books and reciting them over and over to other neighborhood children on the front steps until he could recognize the words. Therefore, when he finally got to first grade to find everyone else laboring over the imbecile adventures of Dick, Jane and...more Peter Straub was born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin on 2 March, 1943, the first of three sons of a salesman and a nurse. The salesman wanted him to become an athlete, the nurse thought he would do well as either a doctor or a Lutheran minister, but all he wanted to do was to learn to read.

When kindergarten turned out to be a stupefyingly banal disappointment devoted to cutting animal shapes out of heavy colored paper, he took matters into his own hands and taught himself to read by memorizing his comic books and reciting them over and over to other neighborhood children on the front steps until he could recognize the words. Therefore, when he finally got to first grade to find everyone else laboring over the imbecile adventures of Dick, Jane and Spot (“See Spot run. See, see, see,”), he ransacked the library in search of pirates, soldiers, detectives, spies, criminals, and other colorful souls, Soon he had earned a reputation as an ace storyteller, in demand around campfires and in back yards on summer evenings.

This career as the John Buchan to the first grade was interrupted by a collision between himself and an automobile which resulted in a classic near-death experience, many broken bones, surgical operations, a year out of school, a lengthy tenure in a wheelchair, and certain emotional quirks. Once back on his feet, he quickly acquired a severe stutter which plagued him into his twenties and now and then still puts in a nostalgic appearance, usually to the amusement of telephone operators and shop clerks. Because he had learned prematurely that the world was dangerous, he was jumpy, restless, hugely garrulous in spite of his stutter, physically uncomfortable and, at least until he began writing horror three decades later, prone to nightmares. Books took him out of himself, so he read even more than earlier, a youthful habit immeasurably valuable to any writer. And his storytelling, for in spite of everything he was still a sociable child with a lot of friends, took a turn toward the dark and the garish, toward the ghoulish and the violent. He found his first “effect” when he discovered that he could make this kind of thing funny.

As if scripted, the rest of life followed. He went on scholarship to Milwaukee Country Day School and was the darling of his English teachers. He discovered Thomas Wolfe and Jack Kerouac, patron saints of wounded and self-conscious adolescence, and also, blessedly, jazz music, which spoke of utterance beyond any constraint: passion and liberation in the form of speech on the far side of the verbal border. The alto saxophone player Paul Desmond, speaking in the voice of a witty and inspired angel, epitomized ideal expressiveness, Our boy still had no idea why inspired speech spoke best when it spoke in code, the simultaneous terror and ecstasy of his ancient trauma, as well as its lifelong (so far, anyhow) legacy of anger, being so deeply embedded in the self as to be imperceptible, Did he behave badly, now and then? Did he wish to shock, annoy, disturb, and provoke? Are you kidding? Did he also wish to excel, to keep panic and uncertainty at arm's length by good old main force effort? Make a guess. So here we have a pure but unsteady case of denial happily able to maintain itself through merciless effort. Booted along by invisible fears and horrors, this fellow was rewarded by wonderful grades and a vague sense of a mysterious but transcendent wholeness available through expression. He went to the University of Wisconsin and, after opening his eyes to the various joys of Henry James, William Carlos Williams, and the Texas blues-rocker Steve Miller, a great & joyous character who lived across the street, passed through essentially unchanged to emerge in 1965 with an honors degree in English, then an MA at Columbia a year later. He thought actual writing was probably beyond him even though actual writing was probably what he was best at - down crammed he many and many a book, stirred by(less)

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Books by Peter Straub

Average rating: 3.98 · 98,216 ratings · 4,032 reviews · 122 distinct works

	Ghost Story 3.86 avg rating — 12,199 ratings — published 1979 — 9 editions	My rating:
	Shadowland 3.82 avg rating — 2,386 ratings — published 1980 — 28 editions	My rating:
	Floating Dragon 3.72 avg rating — 2,371 ratings — published 1983 — 24 editions	My rating:
	Koko 3.49 avg rating — 2,181 ratings — published 1988 — 26 editions	My rating:
	The Hellfire Club 3.57 avg rating — 1,378 ratings — published 1996 — 25 editions	My rating:
	Lost Boy Lost Girl 3.38 avg rating — 1,448 ratings — 24 editions	My rating:
	The Throat 3.84 avg rating — 951 ratings — published 1993 — 22 editions	My rating:
	Mystery 3.86 avg rating — 1,002 ratings — published 1990 — 27 editions	My rating:
	Mr. X 3.43 avg rating — 947 ratings — published 1999 — 24 editions	My rating:
	A Dark Matter 2.90 avg rating — 962 ratings — published 2010 — 10 editions	My rating:

More books by Peter Straub…

Series by Peter Straub

Blue Rose Trilogy (3 books)
by Peter Straub (Goodreads Author)

3.66 avg rating — 4,127 ratings

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Peter's Recent Updates

Peter voted on the list Collections of Short Stories
Mar 29, 2010 09:07am · like · Peter's votes · everyone's votes · vote
Peter gave to: Endless Things (The Aegypt Cycle, #4) by John Crowley read in March, 2010	My rating:
Mar 08, 2010 04:40pm
Peter gave to: Twenty-eight Artists and Two Saints: Essays by Joan Acocella read in March, 2010	My rating:
Mar 08, 2010 04:40pm
Peter gave to: In Other Words by John Crowley read in March, 2010	My rating:
Mar 08, 2010 04:40pm
Peter became a fan of Goodreads Author Margaret Atwood and Kate Christensen
Mar 08, 2010 04:30pm · all of Peter's favorite authors
Peter added: Stranger Things Happen by Kelly Link	My rating:
Feb 28, 2007 02:35pm
Peter added: Magic for Beginners by Kelly Link	My rating:
Feb 28, 2007 02:35pm
Peter added: You Remind Me Of Me by Dan Chaon (Goodreads Author)	My rating:
Feb 28, 2007 02:30pm
Peter added: Among the Missing by Dan Chaon (Goodreads Author)	My rating:
Feb 28, 2007 02:29pm

More of Peter's books…

Quotes by Peter Straub

“Wolf! Right here and now!”
― Peter Straub, The Talisman

tags: wolves

13 people liked it

“Sometimes it is right to fear the dark.”
― Peter Straub

tags: if-you-could-see-me-now

11 people liked it

“To feel our character, our personality, and our personal, hard-won history fade from being is to be exposed to whatever lies beneath these comforting, operational conveniences. What remains when the conscious and functioning self has been erased is mankind's fundamental condition – irrational, violent, guilt-wracked, despairing, and mad.”
― Peter Straub, American Fantastic Tales:Terror and the Uncanny from Poe tothe Pulps

tags: fantastique , horror , madness , mankind

5 people liked it

See all Peter Straub's quotes »

Polls

What should I read next? Considering something spooky for Halloween.

The Host: A Novel-Stephenie Meyer

1 vote, 50.0%

Bag of Bones-Stephen King

1 vote, 50.0%

Ghost Story-Peter Straub

0 votes, 0.0%

Fool's Errand-Robin Hobb

0 votes, 0.0%

The Walking Drum-Louis L'Amour

0 votes, 0.0%

Haunted Lily: The Nightmare Ball-Sidney Fox

0 votes, 0.0%

Jhereg-Stephen Brust

0 votes, 0.0%

Wolves of the Calla-Stephen King

0 votes, 0.0%

Song of Kali-Dan Simmons

0 votes, 0.0%

2 total votes

3 comments

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Topics Mentioning This Author

topics	posts	views	last activity
Beyond Reality: What else are you reading in October 2009?	63	76	Nov 01, 2009 08:34am
The Escapists: A ...: The Talisman by Stephen King/Peter Straub	2	12	Nov 19, 2009 06:28am
The Escapists: A ...: Black House by Stephen King and Peter Straub	4	13	Dec 28, 2009 06:32am
SciFi and Fantasy...: What are you reading in February 2010?	68	200	Mar 02, 2010 08:12am
Book Buying Addic...: February 2010 Purchases	91	138	Mar 15, 2010 04:33am
Book Buying Addic...: Titles A-Z Game	691	372	Apr 21, 2010 07:20pm
The Seasonal Read...: 30.5 (PJ Reads' Task - As Suggested By Tanja - Six Degrees of Separation)	349	356	May 26, 2010 07:44am

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Quotes Peter Likes

“... He was particularly disgruntled to see what he had taken for a bundle of old rags on the tracks outside was a human body. He did not say "Not again" (what he said was "Shit on this"), but "Not again" was what he meant.”
― Peter Straub, Ghost Story

3 people liked it