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List of Influences

For the most part, the things named in these lists are not in any particular order and are subject to change.

The 10 Most Influential Books

Where the Red Fern Grows (Wilson Rawls)

David Copperfield (Charles Dickens)

The Shining (Stephen King)

The Exorcist (William Peter Blatty)

Summer of the Monkeys (Wilson Rawls)

Interview With the Vampire (Anne Rice)

The Lord of the Rings (J.R.R. Tolkien)

The Prydain Chronicles (Lloyd Alexander)

Surprised By Joy (C.S. Lewis)

Salem’s Lot (Stephen King)

The 10 Most Influential Films

It’s A Wonderful Life

The Exorcist

Poltergeist

Interview With the Vampire

The Haunting (1963)

The Birds

The Breakfast Club

The War Wagon

Night of the Living Dead

Dawn of the Dead

The 10 Most Influential Bands

Kiss

Meat Loaf

Judas Priest

Iron Maiden

Styx

REO Speedwagon

Journey

Black Sabbath

Motley Crue

Air Supply

The 10 Most Influential Albums

Rock and Roll Over (Kiss)

Destroyer (Kiss)

Bat Out of Hell (Meat Loaf)

Dead Ringer (Meat Loaf)

Bad for Good (Jim Steinman)

Hi Infidelity (REO Speedwagon)

Escape (Journey)

Paradise Theatre (Styx)

Screaming for Vengeance (Judas Priest)

Killers (Iron Maiden)

The 10 Most Influential Authors

Stephen King

Anne Rice

Charles L. Grant

Wilson Rawls

Charles Dickens

J.R.R. Tolkien

C.S. Lewis

Lloyd Alexander

Robert E. Howard

H.P. Lovecraft

If you're here to find out what made me like I am, you're probably out of luck. For the most part, I had a boring, uneventful childhood -- no child abuse, no incest with my sisters, no Huck Finn-type adventures. Things were pretty calm at the Wedel home. Despite a stable home with no alcohol, drugs or fetish equipment, I still managed to turn out a little warped. The Pentecostal church services are probably to blame for that.

I was born in Stillwater, Okla., in 1966 and we moved to Enid, Okla., about a year later. Some of my earliest memories are of watching The Foreman Scotty Show on a black-and-white TV and winning a call-in contest on the show; the prize was a T.G.&Y. gift certificate. I played in the dirt a lot and had a fire engine peddle car I rode like hell on our back patio.

Somewhere back then, I recall my mom and aunt letting me watch Hitchcock's "The Birds." That scared me a lot.

I have two sisters, both of whom would tell you completely untrue things about growing up with me. I was the perfect angel of a brother.

In the fall of 1979 I met a girl named Kim Hager in the Longfellow Junior High School band. In 1980 we started “going together” and in 1985 we got married. Today, we’ve got four kids and I still kinda like the old lady.

I began writing seriously in 1985, too. There was very little success for a long, long time. My first short story acceptance came in 1987, but that magazine folded before the story was published. My first fiction publication was a story called "Unholy Womb" in the October 1992 issue of The Midnight Zoo.

After high school, I spent 10 years working in machine shops, a career I hated. In 1992 I had a poem published in The Writer that pretty much summed up my life view:

Life on the Clock
The dreariness of tomorrow
Laps onto the shores of today
As I flee
The desolation of yesterday.

At the age of 29 I decided to go to college. I earned a BA in journalism from the University of Central Oklahoma in December 1999. In December 2004 I finished the requirements for a master of liberal studies degree through the University of Oklahoma. From 1997 until 2006 I worked as a reporter for newspapers, including The Oklahoman, The Journal Record and OKC Business News, or as a communications specialist for Conoco Inc., or as director of public relations for Oklahoma City University and the South Oklahoma City Chamber of Commerce. My last PR job was with the Oklahoma Department of Transportation. I was 40 years old and there was something missing in life.

So I became a teacher. I now teach English, and various related subjects like creative writing, science fiction literature, etc., at Western Heights High School. In many ways it's the hardest job I've ever  had, but the reward of seeing a student come to appreciate "Beowulf" or almost dance with excitement over finishing her first short story is a reward you don't get in any other profession.

Me and the family live in central Oklahoma these days. I used to want to move to Oregon, but I suppose I'll always be an Okie, and that's OK, really.

See, I told you there wasn't anything particularly disturbing in my past. At least, nothing I've mentioned here ...

Don't forget to visit me at MySpace