Hello
I've been a fry cook, a carpenter, a newspaper editor, a technical writer, a web developer, and many other things. I'm an early-forties American man. I spent nearly twenty years as a Norse pagan (and was even a Chieftain) before I died, had a jarring near-death experience, woke from a brief coma with brain damage, and returned to Christianity by reading the Bible for myself. I've had a fairly "exciting" life in which I've done a lot of things and met a lot of people. The brain damage, unfortunately, disabled me to the point of being "unemployable"...so rather than give up, I'm using my gift for writing to attempt to make a living. Thank you for visiting my author's site. I greatly appreciate any patronage you can afford, and I hope you enjoy my books.
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My Author Journey
Story time!
The desire to be a writer, for me, started at a very young age. I was still a toddler when I learned my alphabet and began memorizing the Curious George books my mom read to me ad nauseum at my request. I loved that little monkey and his adventures.
When I was in fourth grade, I wrote a paper about the Alamo for school (yes, I’m from San Antonio), and I got in trouble. The teacher thought I had stolen my paper or had someone else write it for me...because it was written at a high school level. My parents had to tell her face-to-face, “That’s just how he writes.” She asked me to write a quick story for her. I did. She was confused, and maybe a little shocked.
What she didn’t know yet was that I was somewhat obsessed with the concept of language. I wanted to understand how people could communicate by making noises or scratching shapes on paper. My dad was a construction worker, and he sometimes took me to work with him. On those few job sites (and at my friend Eddie’s house), I heard Spanish. I started to learn it, little by little. Then German, French, Italian, and several other languages. I never achieved fluency in any of them, but I could generally understand the basics. Russian, Danish, Norwegian. I think I maxed out at 17 languages before I was disabled and the brain damage played havoc with my memory and my ability to speak. I do remember being able to speak with such authentic accents that native speakers couldn’t tell I wasn’t a native speaker myself. Unfortunately, that led to a couple of fights. Fortunately, it also prevented or stopped other fights.
Mostly, my forays into using language have been positive. Some English teachers and professors hated my guts, but overall it’s been good. I dropped out of college for a while due to life getting in the way, and went straight into a job as a newspaper section editor. I was a musician, and wrote all my own songs. I spent a long time as a technical writer and editor. I taught myself to be a web developer and software engineer (add another twenty-something languages to my lexicon).
In my almost nonexistent free time, I wrote stories and screenplays. I loved woodworking. Then, I got really sick and vomited for four months straight. I went from 225 pounds to 120. I went unresponsive during a nap...and, briefly, I died. My body totally ran out of vitamin B1. I stopped breathing. My heart stopped beating. I woke from a brief coma with brain damage that gives me a host of issues. I’m half blind. I’ve lost my sense of balance and muscular coordination, so I’m in a wheelchair. That’s the tip of the iceberg.
...but I’m still pretty good with words.
I’ve always been a writer. The brain damage, though, destroyed my ability to play musical instruments, walk, and type with any speed at all. I can write, but I’m very slow. Since employers value productivity, well, I’m unemployed...but I can still write. That’s what I have left in my toolbox for now. So, three years ago I took the plunge and wrote my first book. Then another, and another. In March (2023), I’ll publish my 13th book.
The upcoming book is titled Prophet Margin, and it’s the third novel in a very long and awesome Christian fiction series called The Sentinel Saga. The Sentinel Saga is a new type of series. It’s Christian fiction…sorta. It’s historical fiction...sorta. It’s Biblical. It’s real life. It explores the Bible and the span of human history. It introduces a few fictional characters and uses their experiences to put Biblical principles into real-life context.
The Bible tells the story of the first several thousand years of human history.
The Sentinel Saga continues the story.
It is not an attempt to rewrite the Bible or human history. It is not a “new Bible.” It’s a very real “what if” that begs the question: “what if the Bible hadn’t ended two thousand years ago?” It is a semi-fictional story that uses current events to show God’s active hand in the ongoing story of humanity.
The Sentinel is essentially meant to be a historian: someone who witnesses and records human history firsthand so God isn't written out of it. All the fighting is necessary because bad people are trying to do really bad things. But he's a historian... and the books are his journals. The record of real human history. With God included.
If you’re interested in this series, I suggest that you start with the first novel, Lies Wide Open. I also have a five book series on Biblical Christianity, an omnibus that puts the entire series in one book, and four nonfiction books about various topics. You can find them all, and what I’m currently working on, at https://daryljkoerth.com/.
I hope you enjoyed my little story time, and maybe learned a little about me. My name’s Daryl! Nice to meet you!