What Inspired Angelguard?

I get asked this a lot.

Now I’m writing this fully aware that most of you don’t know the story except for the blurb that you can find here.

Yes, it’s about the supernatural.

But no, it’s not another vampire, werewolf or extraterrestrial novel. And there is nothing wrong with those novels even though I don’t typically read them.

This is a novel where angels and demons feature as much as humans do. I believe both exist and have an influence in all of our lives.

Now I may have just lost a bunch of readers having read that last line but I hope the rest of you will read on.

I believe in the spiritual world that the Bible talks about.

Don’t worry this isn’t going to be a sermon but rather an outline as how the novel began.

2002 – a watershed year for me

If you haven’t already please have a read of my “About Me.” A lot happened in 2002 for me: went to DisneyWorld, woke with 2 words in my mind, left my job, started hanging out with Jesus again, and started writing what became Angelguard.

In a later post I’ll share more detail about the process I went through over the past ten years to get my first novel written, and accepted by a publisher.

On coming home from Florida I became increasingly unhappy in my job. As a result I started looking around for alternatives and engaged an executive coach to assist me. The 12 weeks I spent working with Brett were tremendous as they helped shape so many aspects of my life, not just career.

Through this process, my desire to be reacquainted in a church community grew strong, not to mention reconnecting with the Big Guy upstairs. But also, a desire that had laid dormant for the best part of 30 years, awakened.

I wrote a lot as a kid. I read a lot of novels too. I loved escaping into the fantasy both outlets took me too. Stories of good and evil featured prominently.

But one day, I can’t even remember when, I just stopped writing.

The Thin Veil

I met Jesus as a 15 year old and soon became interested in the spiritual domain, the one where angels and demons hung out. I didn’t understand it but was fascinated by the Old and New Testament stories of angels appearing.

My Bible knowledge was limited but it too was full of stories featuring good and bad guys and gals.

I read Frank Peretti’s “Darkness” series in the late 80s, early 90s. The two novels were a real eye-opener for me. Besides being great stories, they revealed the “thin veil” that exists between the natural and supernatural worlds. I love that expression: “thin veil”. Erin Healy, a wonderful suspense writer, was the one who introduced me to describing it like that.

Having devoured the two Peretti novels many times, I noted on my invisible Bucket List, a desire to write something where the natural and supernatural worlds collide.

Then I forgot about it, as life got messy.

Back to the Future

I woke that January morning in a Disneyworld hotel with those two words on my lips.

Two words that were also the first I typed when I set out to write my first novel.

“It’s time.”