Hello and welcome to my blog, Western View! My name is Peter West and I am a fiction writer. “Reluctant Journey” is my last published novel and I am currently working on two new novels. In addition to writing fiction, I am also a published poet and an aspiring songwriter. I grew up in Fort Wayne, Indiana and now live in Bloomington, Indiana. Although I have lived in a few other states, Indiana is and always will be home and I’ll always be a Hoosier at heart. I started writing when I was very young. One of my earliest memories was attending a Young Authors Conference in Fort Wayne, where I presented my very first book “The Tale of X-3-9″, which won an award. I have kept my love of writing my entire life and hope someday to be able to write full-time so that I can spend my days between spending time with my family and doing what I truly love to do.
My works are typically mainstream with elements from various genres including mystery, science fiction, fantasy, romance, and even horror. I have far too many “favorite” authors to list them all, but I am most inspired when I read books by James Rollins, Dean Koontz, Stephen King, J.R.R. Tolkien, and Stephen R. Donaldson. The first “serious” fiction that I read was “The Hobbit”, which was followed quickly by The Lord of the Rings trilogy. I would spend the next several years engrossed in the Fantasy genre, soaking up Stephen R. Donaldson’s Chronicles (and Second Chronicles) of Thomas Covenant and novels by Piers Anthony, Raymond Feist and David Eddings among others. I discovered Dean Koontz quite by accident in the early 90′s and spent a summer reading every novel he had published, which at the time was 21 or 22 books I believe. Koontz led me to Stephen King, John Saul, and Robert McCammon. Eventually, I wanted to branch out from fantasy and horror novels, so I began reading science fiction, primarily Poul Anderson and Isaac Asimov. With the increasing popularity of Star Wars, I also found myself caught up in the Star Wars novels as well. I especially liked the X-Wing Rogue Squadron novels and the novels written by Kevin J. Anderson and Michael Stackpole. After Star Wars came Frank Herbert and Dune and Kim Stanley Robinson and the Mars novels (“Red Mars”, “Blue Mars”, “Green Mars” and “The Martians”). A few years ago I was in the bookstore browsing for new reading material and came across a novel cover that caught my eye. I bought it and read it cover-to-cover and couldn’t put it down. Since then, I have read and thoroughly enjoyed every novel that author has written. As someone new to the publishing game, I sent this author an email one day and asked him if he had any advice for a new author. I didn’t really expect to hear anything back, but to my surprise he wrote me back and gave me some great advice. I have stayed in touch with him over the years and consider him a friend. That author — James Rollins. One of my primary goals is to attend the Hawaii Writers Conference in Maui so that I can meet and talk with Jim in person. I should probably also mention that my wife is a huge fan of his and has demanded that she come along too, which I wanted to do anyway.
My wife, Melanie, is my greatest inspiration and is my muse. She and our two daughters are the light of my life. One day when I am able to be a full-time writer, I think I will be able to know true happiness. I really look forward to that day! Not that I am not happy now — I adore my family. I just know deep down that I am not doing what I am meant to be doing on a full-time basis. I’ll get there, hopefully soon and with your help!
I hope that you, faithful reader will bookmark my blog and return on a regular basis to read my sometimes meaningful, sometimes random ramblings about various topics. If you haven’t read my last novel, “Reluctant Journey”, please do so. Take care and see you soon!
Cheers!
~ Peter West
