novels
Like many an English Major, I dreamed of writing a book for many years, but my teenaged self could never hold a story together for more than a dozen pages or so and I entered my twenties with only a Documents folder littered with incomplete manuscripts and half-baked ideas.
In 2010 I traveled to Paris and managed to keep a detailed journal of most of the highlights. That year was also the first of my failed attempts to complete NaNoWriMo and the start of my time playing D&D on a regular basis. These imaginative efforts would fuse with good old fashioned angst to drive me to write my first novel over the winter and spring of 2011-12, thus launching a decade long dream of escaping my job in public education by writing fiction.
Like most dreams, that plan didn't exactly survive contact with reality, but I still managed to write eight full novels and a lot of short stories and outlines before turning my focus to other creative projects.
Apologies for the site looking a little rough and some links being dead. The old version (which I will still be using for classes) is located at my craft subdomain.
Oliver Lucas Adventures
Oliver Lucas is a professional tomb robber, though he prefers to think of himself as an adventure photographer and gentleman relic hunter. It has been a decade since his previous career fell to pieces in the wake of a discovery that led him to abandon academia and begin scouring the world for clues to an ancient conspiracy.
The Staff of Moses
When a powerful man hires Oliver to track down a relic from the pages of history: the staff Moses used to call down plagues, part the sea, and lead the Hebrews out of Egypt. Unfortunately, the scroll that points the way to this relic is in hands of a band of renegade military contractors, and the only connection Oliver has to them is through a disgraced Egyptian spymaster.
Oliver calls on Diana Jordan, an expert in ancient art and languages, and his former lover, to help him translate the scroll. She agrees, and together they set off for Egypt, resolved to track down the staff, no matter who stands in their way.
It isn’t long before Oliver and Diana find themselves in over their heads, confronting undead guardians, ancient cults, and the unleashed power of the staff itself.
The Eye of Odin
When Oliver Lucas captures the research journal of a rival treasure hunter, he uncovers the key to a historical riddle that has eluded him for over a decade. Excited at the prospect of finally unraveling this mystery, Oliver sets off for Germany, where a simple business meeting quickly turns deadly.
Pursued by a supernatural killer, Oliver journeys to the legendary Neuschwanstein Castle to capture a mysterious document from the personal collection of Richard Wagner. Little does Oliver expect that his search will bring him face to face with the man once known as Odin, who offers Oliver his assistance in exchange for a dangerous favor.
Betrayed by a colleague and hunted by supernatural powers, Oliver finds himself trapped in the middle of a struggle between humanity, ancient gods, and a secretive order of angelic beings tasked with guarding a deadly relic.
The Diamond of Souls
It's been months since Oliver Lucas has been able to so much as explore an ancient temple. The uneasy truce between him and the angelic beings known as Watchers has left Oliver unable to continue his quest to find the supernatural shards that have become his obsession, and the idleness is beginning to wear on his patience.
Then he catches the eye of an alluring woman at an underground club. Five minutes later, Oliver and Jeanne are on the run from a pair of deadly corporate operatives.
Thrown together by fate, Jeanne asks Oliver to help her find a long lost family gem. He jumps at the opportunity to join in what at first appears to be a simple treasure hunt, but nothing about this jewel, or the woman who wants it, is as it first appears.
As the mystery deepens, Oliver’s truce with the Watchers is put at risk as he encounters brutal mercenaries, a deadly cult, and ancient magic beyond his comprehension. From the decaying industrial towns of the American south, to the mountains of India, to the depths of the Parisian catacombs, The Diamond of Souls weaves the thrills of a modern adventure tale with the mysterious history of the most famous diamond in the world.
Words of Binding
Seeking to distance himself from the affairs of fallen angels, Oliver Lucas hires out his skills to an enigmatic Japanese business woman who wants him to capture a rare slat book from a remote Chinese monastery. He soon discovers that the book job was only a warmup for his true assignment: To track down and recover a relic bearing fragments of a mysterious, and potentially magical, language.
Oliver travels to China to make contact with a woman believed to be the sole living survivor of a Soviet psychic research program. Just as Oliver believes he has secured documents that might reveal the location of the relic, another treasure hunter enters the fray, seeking revenge on Oliver for beating her to a prize. Forced to work with a rival as devious and talented as himself, Oliver confronts the dark legacy of the Cold War and powers beyond human understanding.
The fourth novel in the Oliver Lucas Adventures series dives headlong into a thrilling tale that fuses stunning locations in Japan, China, and Russia, magical creatures from Asian folklore, and powerful magic into a nonstop adventure.
Echoes of the Fall
With the demonic Oni unleashed from its prison, magical forces have begun to arise across the world. Regular people are corrupted by the power of once hidden relics. Nations fall to the influence of supernatural powers. The Watchers end their long vigil and step into the light, bringing chaos to an already broken world.
Faced with insurmountable odds, Oliver is left with no choice but to gather the last of the magical shards which started him on his life of relic hunting and use them to assemble an arcane mechanism, whatever the cost. He will risk anything, including those he loves most, in order to learn the origin of the Watchers and discover the true purpose of the mystical device.
From the desolate highways of the American west to the uncharted depths of the African jungle, join Oliver as he scours the world for Echoes of the Fall.