He had already decided, if he was ever lucky enough to get something published, he would use the byline W. D. instead of Walter, in tribute to some of his heroes who also used their initials: Thoreau, Chekhov, Salinger.

      He dropped out of college in l967 after one unhappy year, and wrote his first short story working in his parents' basement with a ping-pong table as his desk. His twenties were difficult years, but he never stopped writing, so it's been a continuous working curve from that day to this.

      As for supporting himself, he followed the old tradition whereby a writer works only long enough to earn enough money to quit and write until the money runs out. These jobs included working as a salesman at a department store, an editor at a magazine, a tour guide, and as a teacher.

      His first published story appeared in l976, eight years after he began writing and many rejections. His first novel, Souvenirs, appeared in l981. Two grants from the National Endowment for the Arts allowed him to devote himself to writing full time, and helped make possible a move to Lyme, NH in l982 with his wife Celeste--and Lyme, the "Upper Connecticut River Valley" of Vermont/New Hampshire, is where he's lived ever since. His daughter Erin was born in l986; his son Matthew in  l990.

      Wetherell is the author of over twenty books: novels, short story collections, memoirs, essay collections, and books on travel and history. His essays, short stories, and articles have appeared in a wide variety of publications, including The Atlantic, the Washington Post, the Chicago Tribune, Virginia Quarterly Review, Georgia Review, Appalachia, the Boston Globe, Reader's Digest, Fly-Fisherman, and many more. For eighteen years his essays on travel appeared frequently in The New York Times.

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       His  autobiographcial short story, "The Bass, the River, and Sheila Mant," telling the story of a fourteen-year old boy who must choose between the girl of his dreams and the fish of his dreams, has been anthologized over twenty times, and appears in many textbooks for middle school, high school, and college English.

      Wetherell's awards include two NEA Creative Writing Fellowships, three O'Henry Awards for short stories, the Drue Heinz Literature Prize, the National Magazine Award, the Arnold Gingrich Fly-Fishing Heritage Award, The "Best Short Story" of l993 award from the Catholic Press Association, the Michigan Literary Fiction Award, a National Book Award Nomination, and a New York Times Notable Book of the Year Award in l990. He was Visiting Scholar at the Rockefeller Foundation's Bellagio Center in Italy in l993. In l998, he received the Strauss Living Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters allowing him to devote himself exclusively to writing for the next five years.

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      In 1985, Wetherell was invited to read from his work at the Library of Congress.

      Reviewers and readers, responding to Wetherell's work, have spoken of his wide range of subject matter, approaches, styles, and characterizations, his narrative daring, originality, and compassion,the power  and grace of his prose style and the homage he pays, sometimes subtly, sometimes explicitly, to the long literary tradition that has fueled his writing from the start.

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