Michael C. Beard was born in England and had the great fortune of living in Europe for several years as one of three children of a U.S. Air Force family. He has vivid memories of beautiful mountains, rivers and old castles. He believes those experiences are partially responsible for his love of history, languages and fantasy worlds. Michael has two graduate degrees in ancient languages and linguistics. He taught in the fields of interpretive and semantic sciences, and he also worked on the corporate side of the writing world and technology. Michael lives in Delaware with his wife, Wanda.