Scott Oden

Scott Oden (born June 24, 1967) is an American writer best known for his historical novels set in Ancient Egypt and Ancient Greece. His work imitates the styles and themes of the 1930s pulps, most notably the historical fiction and fantasy of Texan author Robert E. Howard.

Biography Oden was born in Columbus, Indiana in 1967. He graduated from Albert P. Brewer High School in 1985 and attended John C. Calhoun State Community College in Decatur, Alabama, where he studied English and History. Oden began writing at the age of 14, and his first published work was a role-playing game called "Rogue Warrior" in 1986, illustrated by teen-aged Cully Hamner.

Oden published Men of Bronze in 2005. It was followed in 2006 by Memnon and in 2010 with The Lion of Cairo, which mixed pulp-style action and sorcery with Crusader politics in Fatimid Egypt.

In 2017, Oden published A Gathering of Ravens — the first in a projected trilogy of stand-alone novels featuring the savage orc Grimnir. The second book, Twilight of the Gods, appeared in 2020. The third book in the trilogy, The Doom of Odin was published in 2023.

The Garden

In 2025, Oden published "A Clockwork's Dreaming and Other Tales," a collection of whimsical stories detailing the adventures of various mice and other small creatures living in an enchanted French garden. The work represents a significant departure from his historical fiction and sword-and-sorcery, exploring themes of memory, connection, and the magic found in everyday life.

Influences Oden identifies his writing influences as J. R. R. Tolkien, H. P. Lovecraft, Robert E. Howard, Mary Renault, Harold Lamb, Karl Edward Wagner, and Steven Pressfield.