About

The Author, Denis R. O’Neill

For almost fifty years Denis O’Neill has been telling stories in magazines and books. On the big screen, Meryl Streep, Kevin Bacon, Robert Duvall and Michael Keaton have brought other stories to life. Denis has written documentaries and host copy for several of public television’s most beloved and well-known programs. He has published six books including a college memoir, two outdoor thrillers, two books of essays (Musings), and most recently an illustrated children’s book called Bradford’s Walk.

Denis grew up with his three brothers in Greens Farms, Connecticut, a few hundred yards from a muddy brook that offered up trout and bullheads in warm weather, and flowed from a woodland pond that froze in winter to inspire many a shinny hockey game.

His father was a writer and a Civil War historian; the tap-tap-tap of his manual typewriter providing a constant soundtrack at 3 Turkey Hill Circle. His mother, who like his father served in the OSS in WW II, managed the well-being of four boys born in five years with a blend of common sense and uncommon patience.

After Dartmouth College, where he captained the hockey team, Denis worked as an ordinary seaman for long enough to make enough money to travel for some months in Europe, Great Britain, and Ireland. He returned to Boston where he became a folk singer for three years (Melville & Rockwell), then earned a masters degree in journalism from Boston University.

Denis worked on staff and as a free-lance writer/producer for Boston’s public television station, WGBH-TV — writing copy and host copy for such programs as Frontline, Mystery, Masterpiece Theatre, The National Ballroom Dancing Championships, Irish Treasure, and No Irish Need Apply.

He began publishing articles and short stories in Sports Illustrated, The Boston Globe Sunday Magazine, Fly Rod , Antiques, American Photographer and others. In 1986 he moved to Los Angeles.

His original screenplay, The River Wild, was produced in 1994, directed by Curtis Hanson, starring Meryl Streep, Kevin Bacon, David Strathairn and John C. Riley. A Shot At Glory, directed by Michael Corrente and starring Robert Duvall as an old school, second division Scottish football (soccer) manager, was released in 2001.

His Dartmouth memoir WHIPLASH – When the Vietnam War rolled a hand grenade into the Animal House was published in the fall of 2013. His stand-alone novel, The River Wild, inspired by his original screenplay for that movie, was published by Skyhorse Publishing in June, 2017.

During the Covid lockdown beginning in 2020, Denis wrote and posted a series of Pandemic Musings on Facebook. They were published in 2021 as a collection of essays about politics, food, nature, science, friends and history. In 2022, Denis released his High Sierra, horror thriller Canis Dirus. It involves a pack of prehistoric wolves, trapped for ten thousand years in a High Sierra cavern, who are unleashed by a powerful earthquake to terrorize visitors to Yosemite National Park over a crowded Fourth of July weekend.

The Author, Book Reading

Most recently, he published a second edition of Facebook Musings (Musings ~2022) that Kirkus Review described as “A peppery and unfailingly compelling set of reactions to one Calamitous year.”

Kirkus describes Bradford’s Walk as “a charming depiction of simple pleasures”… “an illustrated, poetic narrative for all ages.”

Denis has three sons from his marriage to Deborah McLeod. He holds an Irish passport.