Look and Listen

Biography

My debut bestselling YA novel, ParaWorld Zero, was published January 2008 by Windstorm Creative and placed in 10 book/audiobook contests. Reviewers are calling it a "Harry Potter meets Star Wars." The audiobook and E-Book came out at the end of 2008 and are available from audible.com, sony.com (Sony Reader), and Amazon.com (Kindle). I've also won or placed in several writing contests such as Writers Digest, writersweekly.com, SpecFicWorld.com, Science Fiction Writers of Earth, and Ralan's Spectravaganza. I have 5 boys, two of whom are red-headed twins. I'm a 2nd degree black belt and a computer programmer. Learn more at my website: www.ParaWorlds.com

Inspiration

Early fantasy and scifi authors such as J.R.R. Tolkien and Douglas Hill inspired me to write. I actually started my Parallel Worlds series when I was around 14 years old. Over a decade later, I picked it back up after reading the first Harry Potter book and realizing that my book was very similar (13-year old boy discovers he has magic and prepares to go to a magic school). I had to drastically change my book, of course, so that it didn't look like a Harry Potter knock-off. But with every Harry Potter book that comes out I've had to cringe because the author keeps using ideas that my book already has.