David Calder

Someone asked me, “Why do you write?” I answered, “If I didn’t, I wouldn’t know who I was.” I seem to have been lucky enough to have hurtled through life colliding with powerful events, while somehow defying the law of diminishing return. By that I mean intensely painful experiences that should have been crippling (and certainly felt that way at the time) have forced me to look inside myself and at least strive to become the decent person I should have been all along. Writing began seriously for me, within a formative relationship during my Auckland University years that stopped, but continues to shape me to this day. From that relationship I discovered who I really am, and there’s not a day goes by, that while I regret the relationship stopped,  I don’t thank my lucky stars for the empowerment it has given me. It only I had been as true to myself back then, but life’s not about ‘if only,’ is it? Through my writing back at the time I spent some time at an American university, which in turn gave me residency and US citizenship (of which I am very proud.) After a couple of great careers in the auto and IT industries in California and Washington. I’ve been back in NZ since late 1995. Since then I’ve continued to work at least part-time in IT but have moved entirely into the writing side, producing system, corporate, and technical documentation for large IT projects. On the fiction front, I write for the American mass paperback and Kindle, thriller market (US spelling and themes.) My first novel, REDEMPTION COVE (2014) is partly autobiographical, drawing on my experiences with crime and self-discovery in the Seattle software industry, and my love for the outdoors, particularly the wild country of the Canadian Northwest. THE CHILDREN OF THE NAKBA (2015) draws in a deep interest I have in Middle-Eastern affairs, and my belief that Israel has been, and is being, unfairly treated. Based on real events from 1978, I hope it makes accessible to other non-Jewish readers with the interest, what really goes on there behind the scenes, as well as exposing the ugly face of international terrorism for what it is. My current projects are a short-story collection, a follow-up to REDEMPTION COVE set in southern France—where my hero Ben Adams gets involved in the mystery of Picasso’s lost paintings, and a follow up to THE CHILDREN OF THE NAKBA based on another tragic and Israeli-societally transforming terrorist event; Ma’a lot. David Calder September 2017

Genre:

    Skills:

    Branch:

    Auckland

    Location:

    Auckland

    Publications:

    REDEMPTION COVE

    Ben Adams is out of control, but the truck hurtling at him out of the Seattle snow is the least of his problems. The workaholic computer programming genius and former child chess champion, has been dragging a past behind him he can’t shake. This just finally throws him over the cliff. “Go back to where you are broken Ben and fix it,” he hears. Can he really get off the merry-go-round, and start over? Ben discovers himself and his true loves, in the skies and rugged wilds of British Columbia. But powerful figures in the Washington State software industry won’t let him go that easily. Entrapped into a morass of stock fraud, blackmail and murder, Ben must use every skill he possesses, battling for physical and emotional survival against biker thugs, aerial killers, the governments of two countries, even the largest predator on earth. Now the clock is against him too …

    THE CHILDREN OF THE NAKBA

    This based-on-a-true-story, suspenseful and explosive novel by David Calder, takes the reader right into the heart of the worst terrorist attack ever on Israeli soil. Abu Jihad, head of the Palestinian terrorist organization Fatah, and chief instigator of the Civil War raging in Lebanon, has serious problems. On the brink of exposure in an affair with one of his female Lieutenants–a mistake sure to outrage the conservative Middle East leaders backing him, he’s terrified it will also set off a blood-feud with his wife’s violent relatives. And Egypt has shockingly extended an olive branch to Israel. His entire vicious empire depends on endless war between Arabs and Jews. If Israel accepts, the U.S.A. gets involved, and peace breaks out, he’ll be out of a job! All his power and prestige, not to mention his bodyguards–gone! Jihad schemes up the perfect solution. He’ll show everyone there can be no peace in the Middle East without a homeland for the Palestinians. And be rid of his troublesome lover at the same time! He recruits a band of killers from the Lebanese War, appoints his lover one of the leaders and his best warrior as the other, and launches them on an amphibious suicide attack on Tel Aviv to sabotage the peace process. Betrayed and abandoned in a storm, the terrorists are shipwrecked 40 miles north of their target. Determined to fulfill their mission they seize 70 hostages as human shields and charge south on a murderous rampage. Israeli Security forces are caught flat-footed on the Shabbat. At first no-one will believe it is happening. Events are moving too fast for Israel’s elite Special Forces to come to the rescue. If falls to a makeshift force; a few Police SWAT team members, poorly armed traffic-policemen and off-duty soldiers, to defend the nation. Can these heroes, fighting a running battle nearly the length of the country, prevent the terrorists from reaching their helpless target and wreaking unimaginable havoc? Sound far-fetched? The backstory is literally from the front page of the New York Times.

    Shorter Journeys

    Short Story Collection Nine stories to transport the reader from the crests of the Andes to the streets of Sydney, Australia, and across prairies on the steel steeds of the new cowboys of the American West. Also to the terrible frozen wastes of a Europe torn by evil and war, through the looking glass into the angst-filled mind of youth, and down through time to the ponderings of the father of modern thinking. These journeys will intrigue, amuse, illuminate; and above all,: entertain.

    Emotional Paleontology

    Poetry Collection Recently an online interviewer—knowing I wrote poetry long before I was a novelist—asked, “What can a poem can do that a long narrative can’t?” I replied that a poem has unique abilities. To polish a thought and make it perfect. A poem allows contrasting thoughts to be powerfully juxtaposed. A good poem can carry emotion from line to line in the least possible number of words. And poetry, like song, can touch you in an instant and carry you magically to a place and time. I don’t pretend to be able to fly any of those off my fingertips at will. I just humbly hope that readers will feel I have approached one or more of them within this collection. This collection spans many stages and aspects of my life. The awkwardness of youth perhaps. Dealing with the overpowering wonder of love. And the bitterness of loss. The fragility of things cared deeply for. Also those emotions that have redirected, inspired and endured in my life.