Born August 16, 1956, in Danville, Illinois…. forty miles due east of Champaign — Urbana, site of the U. of I. (home of H.A.L.). In school, during my formative years, I pulled myself up from having a report card like an alphabet to graduating #20 out of a graduating class of 780, plus 50 other students who failed grade 12. Still not good enough for the U. of I., I enrolled at Eastern Illinois University in Charleston, Illinois as an Art Studio Major and an English Minor. Several jobs later (including a year as an Assistant Park Ranger at Kickapoo State Park during my Senior year of High School and a two year stint full time as an architectural draftsman at I.B.C. Homes) I graduated with a B.A. in 1981 with a failed marriage disintegrating on me and the worst job market since 1929. I began writing novels in 1977, and have been doing it, on and off, ever since. In 1983 I began on a prolific writing spurt that is still going strong…. resulting in several million words worth of manuscripts. I write primarily science fiction and fantasy genre material.