About the author

My name is Nick. I’m twenty-eight years old. I live in Peoria, Illinois.

I want to write a high fantasy novel.

A lot of details about my past can already be read about in my journal entries, but a writer’s life is reflected in every word they write. So …
Here’s a quick summary – a lot of what I didn’t mention in the writer’s journal is here:

I had a decent childhood, but school was kind of rough for me. Academically, it was never too challenging, but as far as fitting in … I just couldn’t relate to the other kids very well. My ‘best’ friends were usually my only friends. So each day, I hid in my imagination, always creating art … poetry … things of that nature. As I got older, it probably got worse, despite working hard for both of my parent’s businesses. And they grew suspicious of the direction my life was heading. I got so lost in my world at times that bad things would sometimes result from my inattention to life, such as letting my grades fall, and even getting in a few car accidents.

I’m proud to say I handled the day my own mother knocked on my bedroom door and asked me to leave home with dignity and grace. And I even handled my father’s threat well; that if I wasn’t out by the next day, he would leave all of my things out on the road. I never raised my voice and never argued a word of it. I just said, “That’s fine,” and started packing, knowing full well I had a long, hard road ahead of me. Jobless and without a vehicle, I was forced to put college on hold. I had to drift from place to place until I could afford to pay rent. Tough issues had to be dealt with on a daily basis, such as short bouts of homelessness, mild starvation, trying to find jobs with no real transportation, having rotten roommates, being hassled by the police while walking to work, being stolen from on numerous occasions, trying to figure out how to pay emergency medical bills with no insurance, and struggling to keep lowsy blue collar jobs in the face of depression. There were days when the only thing I could do to get myself to work was literally put one foot in front of the other.

I swore I would never let life defeat me, no matter what. And my girlfriend, G, was invaluable in helping me though it all. I studied computer technology with a vengeance, and finally landed a job doing computer tech support. From there, I was able to build an extensive work history in computer technology. I carefully saved up my money and was able to return to college, abandoning my art major and picking up computer science. Now, I have the honor of working for a Fortune 500 company, and am proud to say I ended up staying with G through all those hard years. And finally, we got married. And I would do it all again.

G and I went off to Japan on our honeymoon. As the plane lifted off, it was as if I was waving goodbye to all of my troubles and starting a new life. I was finally going to get to see the ocean, the mountains … I was finally going to leave the United States and see the world.
Needless to say, it was magical.

We’ve been married for about a year now and are looking to have children. Last Fall, I started getting interested in writing, and here I am.

I was thankful for the hardships I had to face over the last decade. They taught me (probably a little too much) about life (in too short an amount of time), but there was tremendous value to be had in that. Oh, and my parents warmed back up to me over the years. They even helped me out of a few jams. In the end, it all turned out to be for the best. To this day, my parents and I are on excellent terms with each other, and all has been forgiven.

“Ok, here’s the point in the story where I have this cathartic revelation that suicide’s wrong, that life’s worth living and everything’ll be OK. Yeah, right. And that’s why this story doesn’t work! ‘Cause I just don’t buy it.”
“Nobody buys it, but that’s not why you go on.”
“Why then?”
“Because things’ll change. You’ll change.”
“What about right now?”
“Right now, you wait.”
~circa 1995, The Maxx

Continued 06/04/2008…

The more I’ve thought about it, writing fiction is, in a strange way, recording your memoirs—-but it’s in a language only the author understands.
I’ve always been a bit wary of people writing their own biographies. If a life story is worth hearing, wouldn’t somebody else be writing it?

And without further ado…
…your sleepy author!

And now for some random facts. (wow, you’re really reading this? :D)
I am a Scorpio.
Born late October.
Just shy of Halloween.
Autumn is my favorite season.
Halloween is my favorite holiday.
I gave away my bed to charity while I was in high school.
I have suffered from kidney stones.
They were formed from calcium.
They leave me alone now.
My favorite type of music is trance.
But I try to listen to everything.
I’ve had two bikes stolen from me when it was my only transportation.
I have worked at least part time since I was thirteen.
I’ve worked …
with mentally handicapped people.
In an assembly line.
In a cafeteria.
As a transporter for recycled goods.
As a house cleaner.
With lawn care.
With landscaping.
At an outbound call center.
At inbound call centers.
Freelance repairing computers.
As computer tech support.
As a network technician.
At a service desk.
At three restaurants. (Including a pizza place where they toss the dough.)
I don’t like onions.
I’ve spent hours picking them out of my food.
I have a strong affinity to animals.
Rabbits actually intrigue me, and I think that’s why I liked Watership Down.
I love to play Go.
Go is a board game over 3000 years old.
Also known as Igo, Weiqui, or Baduk.
My wife loves to play a variant of Go called Caro.
My sight is much better than most people’s.
My favorite video game is Final Fantasy VI.
It helped me get through the rough times at high school.
So did my dog, Mugsy.
Here’s what he looked like.

Yes, that’s his cute little head smooshed over a pillow.
Sadly, he passed away a few months ago.
My first RPG was Dragon Warrior.
My first anime was Tekkaman.
The original 1975 version, not the remake.
My first fantasy book was The Hobbit.
My favorite fantasy book so far is Lord of Chaos.
I was a Cub Scout, but thankfully skipped Tiger Cubs.
I was a Boy Scout for about one week before I got sick of it.
My favorite movie of all time is Last of the Mohicans.
I don’t watch TV.
Unless I’m bored and at my wife’s parent’s house.
I often find myself singing songs.
My wife sings them with me.
Once, I fell asleep at the wheel on a major highway.
I woke up in an accident.
I had rear-ended a car.
Luckily, no one was hurt.
I was about 40 meters from a concrete wall.
You can’t imagine what it feels like to wake up from the slam of an accident you caused from falling asleep until you experience it and somehow survive.
Needless to say, I felt lucky to be alive.
The EMTs said I had the slowest pulse of anyone they had ever recorded immediately after an accident.
It’s because I had suddenly become extremely calm and confident.
I knew I survived for a reason.
I felt the accident was my ‘wake-up call’.
I was ready to take the reigns of my life and charge forward.
And that revelation came for me just in time.