Rediscovering Information

I'm one of those strange people who reads historical non-fiction for fun. Yes, I do it as research for my books as well, but sometimes I'll pull a random book off my shelf and sit down for ten minutes or so and just read. Doing this, I find tidbits and facts from history and mythology that end up in my stories. Usually this amounts to cultural details or even place names based on real events.

The funny thing is when later I can't remember where I got the tidbit.

Case in point: while going through my revisions for my work in progress, I couldn't for the life of me remember where I got the name for my god of war, Catur. I googled it and found no reference to the name at all. Since I like my names to be based on something more than random letters, I went looking for a new name (wasting more hours than I'd like to admit) and ripped off Laran from the Etruscans.

Today, I pulled a random book off my shelf (A History of Pagan Europe by Prudence Jones) and flipped it open to the forgotten book mark. There, staring at me underlined among a listing of Celtic gods was "... Caturix (battle-king)."

NOW I remember... Instead of just dropping the suffix "-rix" I kept the "r"...

Long story short: I need to keep better notes.


Recent News

July, 22 2010

Echoes of Truth is revised and polished. I'm ready to start querying agents, the next step in seeing this novel published. In the meantime, work on the Condotierre is underway. I'm as excited to start this new book as I am to have finished my last.

September, 2 2008

SAEtter.com version 2.0, the Professional Edition is now live! Feel free to explore the new site and features.

About the Author

While reading The Fellowship of the Ring at the age of twelve, Stuart A. Etter was told by his teacher that he should be reading shorter books. Undaunted, he finished the trilogy and promptly moved on to other novels ranging from fantasy/sci-fi to historical fiction to horror to thrillers.

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Prologue: The Prisoner

Damion rubbed the dull ache of age from his hands. Countless years wielding a sword had strengthened his tendons and muscles, but time had worn them down, replacing power with chronic pain. Closing his eyes, Damion dreamed of his youth. Battle and victory marked most of his memories, but darker images tainted his successes, reminding him of his one great...