A Word In Your Ear: How God changed my retirement plans

A Christian tale: a journey.Unusual for an established thriller writer to pen a religious book, you might say, but as a born again Christian I have no problem with the path God chose for me. If He hadn’t wanted me to write the kind of novels I do, he wouldn’t have opened the doors. But he did want me to do work for Him, and my story is how He changed my life when my wife and I arrived in Spain to enjoy our early retirement. We weren’t even Christians then. The sermons I have included in my book are almost all personal experiences of mine within the Christian world and life in general. I hope they will be meaningful to you and just as important; I hope you enjoy them.

I have been writing thrillers for many years and have experienced the highs and lows of being a writer. My first novel, NORTH SLOPE was published in 1980, and is now available as a POD paperback and Kindle on Amazon. I have been married to Patricia for fifty four years and we live in Spain. We have four sons, ten grandchildren and one great grandson. My hobby is writing, of course, and to date I have had eight novels published. I am a born again Christian I worked as a maintenance technician most of my adult life, serving sixteen years in the Royal Air Force, and about seventeen years with a food manufacturer. I retired in 1996 (I was fifty five years old) and moved out to Spain a year later. Pat and I have lived here, on the Costa Blanca for seventeen years. We are now planning to return to the UK. Other jobs I have done include Merchant Seaman, Office boy, and general maintenance for a chicken farmer! I have received many excellent comments about my writing, but the proof of the pudding, as they say, is in the eating. I am a member of the International Thriller Writers and used to be a contributing editor with them. In 2009, I worked on a global project with eleven other writers and produced a novel called PASSAGE TO REDEMPTION. This is now available as a POD novel and Kindle by Acclaimed Books Ltd. (www.acclaimedbooks.com) of which I am an associate. For those of you who want to know a little more about me, and see me ’in the flesh’, check out my website at www.michaeljparker.com, where you’ll be able to see a couple of TV interviews I have had. My last thriller novel titled THE BOY FROM BERLIN was released in December 2011. It has been picked up by Harlequin who have purchased (leased) the English language paperback rights for North America and Canada. This has been published (2013) now in paperback. Meannwhile my current paperbacks; NORTH SLOPE, a COVERT WAR ROSELLI’S GOLD, HELL’S GATE, THE DEVIL’S TRINITY, and SHADOW OF THE WOLF (March 2013) are available on Amazon and Kindle. THE EAGLE’S COVENANT paperback is available on Amazon.co.uk only because Harlequin have now agreed to publish THE EAGLE’S COVENANT in USA and Canada. This is a story set in modern Germany. It is one of my favourites and I have high hopes for it on the American market. My latest title, PAST IMPERFECT will be published by my London publisher, Hale, in 2014. This is a romance with a rough edged back story. Something of a change from my other titles.