Growing up in Third Ward, Houston, Texas, a not so great neighborhood (to put it lightly), I found great solace in two things: classical music; and fiction.
Anything to take my mind off of the theater of life on the other side of the walls and windows.
During my first visit to Colorado in the late 70’s, I found my true home. Though it took us half a lifetime to get here, my wife of 37 years and I moved to the Pikes Peak area in 2003, and love it.
My love of reading carried through college where I found tabletop gaming and its deep dive into world-building and creativity. My first foray into creative writing was an adventure I crafted as a newly minted Dungeon Master for our tabletop RPG group. Through eight years in the U.S. Navy, I kept reading and gaming. It helped me through times I spent overseas defending our freedoms. Not all sailors spend their careers on ships.
When my two daughters were young, I wrote a story for them, a chapter at a time, and read them as bedtime stories. Unfortunately, life intruded and I never finished the tale. Many years later, they urged me to do so and I sat down to continue. I discovered I was no longer the person who began that story.
However, I found my niche in dark fiction (fantasy, sci-fi, action and romance, usually blended together). It was cathartic since I could weave real-life experiences into my stories without breaking any oaths. So far, I've published two non-fictions, one novel, an anthology and the first short story in a new urban fantasy universe steeped in West African mythology.
The first non-fiction was about emotional intelligence and how it helped me heal after my service. My second, "Beyond the Nile: Gods and Legends from the Heart of Africa," re-connected me to my ancestral roots.
My debut fiction novel, "In the Ghost’s Shadow," was a romantic suspense genre/blend about the youngest son born with genetic mutations forced upon his parents and sister before his conception and the young woman/frenemy he fell in love with. My fourth offering was an anthology containing expanded versions of seven of the stories my former imprint published. I named it "Wicked Shadow Whispers Anthology Volume 1: Beyond the Veil."
You can find links to all on my website www.authorcliftonbrown.com.