Doug Hiser was born, May 14th, 1957 in Galveston County, Texas. His parents, Douglas and Annette Hiser raised him in Santa Fe, Texas, which was actually known as Alta Loma, Arcadia and Algoa back then, communities along Hwy 6 between Hitchcock and Alvin, Texas. His father had a small farm and they owned chickens, cattle and other assorted animals. Doug is the oldest of four siblings. He has two younger brothers, Gerald, and Johnny, and one sister, Patricia. Growing up in a small Texas town had many advantages like the freedom to explore the prairies and the woods. Doug grew up loving nature and the wilds. As a youth he captured anything that crawled, jumped or flew.

His father helped him with his interest in nature and he assisted him with cages and enclosures for the many animals he brought back from the wild. When he was a teenager he had a small native Texas zoo containing as many as thirty-two turtles, armadillos, opossums, gar, bullfrogs, horned lizards and many snakes and birds. His father was also a talented artist and they had several oil paintings hanging in their home depicting roosters, and other animals. Watching his father draw animals with a pencil influenced Doug to begin to draw at an early age.

Doug started drawing all kinds of wildlife and he was also interested in the comic books his mother sometimes bought him. He was introduced to Batman, Spiderman, the X-men, Daredevil, and Tarzan. He would draw from the comic books and incorporate heroic figures with animals. Doug also loved sports and started playing all sports very young. He played football, baseball, basketball, and ran track in high school. He would draw football players with pencil by looking at the black and white photos in the newspaper. Doug continued to draw throughout high school but did not start writing stories until much later. An important turning point in his life happened his senior year at Santa Fe High School.

He started to read novels and to listen to music. The first novel he picked up was Journey to the Center to the Earth by Jules Verne. This started a floodgate of reading and Doug has continued to read books endlessly to this day. The music that influenced him was not the popular artists of the day but music from Rick Wakeman, Peter Gabriel, Genesis, music that wasn’t popular until many years later. He was influenced in those years by John Norman’s GOR novels, Edgar Rice Burrough’s Tarzan and other novels, Stephen R. Donaldson’s Thomas Covenant Chronicles, and eventually he discovered Stephen King, Dean R. Koontz, and many others which influenced his early reading years.

Doug hired on at the Texas City Post Office in 1978. He was the Mailman delivering to John Lee Hancock’s house, Director of the Disney movie, “The Rookie” and Screenwriter of Kevin Coster’s “Perfect World”, in Texas City. His daughter, Heather Nicole, was born in 1982. The early 80’s Doug played football, hockey, and softball and became interested in bodybuilding. He began working out religiously and entered his first bodybuilding competition after one year of training. He won Best Posing at the competition and was on the cover of the Galveston Daily News. This inspired him even more and he continued with bodybuilding for the next 12 years. He did art on the side sporadically, winning Best of Show in 1980 at the Mainland Art Show, doing signs for business’s, T-shirt artwork for sports teams, etc. In 1989, his son, Cade Douglas, was born.

Doug’s life was spent around his children, sports and reading. The art was there but mostly as a pastime now. Another turning point in his life came in 1991. He decided to go back to college and get a degree. Bodybuilding was not as important anymore and he needed a new sport so he tried out for the college soccer team and became the goalkeeper. He was accepted as Phi Theta Kappa, National Honor Society Fraternity in 1992, the same year he appeared on the American Gladiators Television show. He transferred to University of Houston at Clear Lake and graduated in 1996 as Student of the Year in the Arts and Humanities with a degree in Applied Design and Visual Art. College was the greatest influence on his art and writing resurgence. He was introduced to many of his favorite artists and writers during these years. Writers like Rick Bass, Alice Hoffman, and Joe Lansdale, artists like Frank Frazetta, Roger Dean, and William Stout.

Doug began winning art shows and writing competitions at conferences. He self published his first book, BITE OF THE MAILMAN in 1994, containing his award winning literary short fiction piece, “Alligator Salesman”. He also started reading stories in local schools in the Writer’s in Schools project. He started competing in the many poetry slam competitions around Houston winning the Houston poetry Slam in 1993 at Catal Hayak. The poetry chapbook Shards of Lies was published in 1993, followed by The Seven Rages (lust to love) and finally Whiskey Moon in 2001.

With the influence of his wife, Gayln, an Athletic Director and coach for CCISD, in 2000, he once again turned his energies to art and writing, and he won first place in the Texas City Art Festival in 2001 with a pen and ink, Extinction, that she insisted he enter. The short story anthology, award-winning book, SECRET GROTTO followed in 2001. In 2002 another novel, Cavern of the Eggstone and Lost Oasis, a poetry anthology followed. In 2003 his first hardback book, CROW CANYON was published. A young adult anthology, WINK EYE CREEKalso followed in 2003. Writing and publishing many short stories in 2004-05, in 2006 the novel, The Honey Bee Girl was published.

Doug continues to write novels, short stories, poems, and will publish many more in the years to come. Books in the works include, MONTANA MIST and won honors at the Writer’s conference at the University of Houston. THE OLOBE’ PUMBA, an adventure romance set in Africa, a mystery novel, CHICKEN NIGHT, and a fantasy novel, THE MIDNIGHT JUNGLE are all in the works. His artwork is all over the web, signs, shirts, murals, book covers, business logos and posters. He continues to put artwork in shows. Doug performs readings and is a public speaker at Writing Conferences, Art meetings, or other public gatherings. Doug is available as a public speaker or guest author. Doug and Gayln continue to play soccer together and travel as much as they can. Visiting many parts of the world is the greatest inspiration for writing and has had a huge impact on Doug’s writing. He is a conservationist and animal lover, but Doug Hiser is not just an athlete, artist, or author, he is a sensitive, imaginative, creative individual with unusual talents to share with the world.