About the Author

Austin Gunderson is the author of “The Heir and the Herald” tetralogy, the first three installments of which are coming soon from Creative Texts.

It was a math curriculum that sparked Austin’s love for storytelling. He was in fourth grade and was supposed to be studying long division, but the mining colony of gnomes whose procurement and distribution of jewels formed the backdrop to the day’s lesson had seized his imagination. Who were these people, what drove them to delve as they did, and which threats confronted their quaint kingdom?

It would be years before Austin began constructing his own fantasy world. He grew up in Washington State where the shining summers were for waging war in the woods and the somber winters were for reading. At the age of twelve he devoured The Lord of the Rings. As soon as he turned the last page he began it again, in awe of a secondary world so vast and deep it overspilled his memory. And then he began dreaming his own dream.

Now Austin is privileged to make his living from what he loves. By day he edits video; by night he writes high fantasy. He lives with his wife and three daughters in the shadow of North America’s steepest mountain range. If he has anything to say about it, he’ll be telling stories for the rest of his life.