Background

Boyd Morrison was born on February 17, 1967, in the United States.

Education

Boyd Morrison has earned a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering from Rice University and a Ph.D. from Virginia Tech in industrial engineering.

Career

Boyd Morrison has worked for various high-profile organizations, some of them are Fortune 500 companies. For instance, he has worked for Lockheed Corporation on behalf of NASA projects. Another notable company in which he worked is Microsoft, wherein he developed Xbox games. He has also featured in the Jeopardy! contest and he aced.

Morrison has always harbored writing ambitions. Unfortunately for him, his wife was schooling at a medical institution, meaning he was the sole breadwinner. As such, he was working full-time, thereby leaving no room to indulge in his pastime–writing. After his wife completed her medical studies and started practicing, he plunged head-on into writing.

Boyd Morrison debuted in 2005 and his first book was self-published. However, his books have since been republished by established publishers under new titles. Morrison’s debut novel, albeit a standalone book, is titled The Catalyst, but it was originally published under the title The Adamas Blueprint. Even then Morrison published the book called The Ark in 2009, which is the first book in his first series, titled Tyler Locke series.

The Ark has over thirty-five editions; the first edition was initially published in 2009, titled The Ark (alternatively called The Noah’s Ark Conquest, especially in the UK), and the action-packed series is shelved as literary fiction, thriller, mystery, suspense, and action genres.

Another early book published by Boyd Morrison is The Vault. This book is also known as The Midas Code, notably in the UK. It has over twenty editions; the very first edition was initially published in 2011. The featured protagonist in the said series is Tyler Locke. Incidentally, Locke was previously an army combat engineer but is presently working with a consultancy firm called Gordian, wherein he is situated on a Canadian-based oil rig. His father is a powerful US Army general.

In The Ark, the featured contagonist is Dilaria Kenner, an archaeologist, while the antagonist is Sebastian Ulric, a wealthy chemist but heartless man intent on cleansing the globe. By the same token, in the book titled The Vault, the contagonist is Stacy Benedict while the antagonist is Jordan Orr. Benedict is a media personality and Orr is a man on the quest for material wealth by all means necessary.

On the one hand, the launching pad of The Ark is two assassination attempts on the life of archaeologist Dilara Kenner. During the first attempt, a friend was killed, prompting her to make bolt for it; in his throes of death, the deceased friend told her a cryptic message concerning the discovery of the Biblical Noah’s Ark and about an ancient artifact. During the second incident, she is involved in an aircraft accident near the oil rig where Locke works but she and the rest of the passengers are saved by Locke. People have either been killed or abducted by antagonist Sebastian Ulric after they nearly discovered the location of the Ark; Ulric plans to shelter the brightest earthlings in the Ark, to “reboot” the world thereafter after he annihilates the rest of the world using a chemical weapon. Now Kenner and Locke are racing against time to save mankind.

On the other hand, the turning point in The Vault is a mysterious informant who informs protagonist Locke that there is a ticking bomb that a malicious person has planted a bomb on the very ferry he has boarded. He teams up with contagonist Stacy Benedict, a language professional, to neutralize the bomb. But the bomb threat is not a random incident. It is an underhand tactic, alongside kidnapping their main characters’ close relatives, used by antagonist Jordan Orr to prompt Benedict and Locke to decipher an encrypted ancient text for a treasure-hunting mission; deciphering it is the gateway to locating King Midas tomb wherein lies unbelievable quantities of gold. But it is not an easy feat because no man has ever accomplished it for two millennia.

The Ark, The Vault, and Rogue Wave are the best books penned by Boyd Morrison. The Ark and The Vault have just been discussed, but herein lies the description of Rogue Wave. Rogue Wave is a standalone book which was first published in 2009 and was originally titled The Palmyra Impact. The featured protagonist is Kai Tanaka who is the director of a Honolulu-based tsunami warning and advisory center. Tanaka dismisses a small seismic incident in an isolated part of Honolulu but is surprised when a commercial aircraft disappears within the site. Soon he realizes that Honolulu, plus his beloved family, might be doomed by damnable gigantic seismic waves so he has to cushion them against the furious Mother Nature.

Readers who were happy to read the Tyler Locke series by Boyd Morrison were also glad to read the following related series. The first one is the Hawker & Laidlaw series authored by Graham Brown. Danielle Laidlaw, who is an undercover agent, and a soldier of fortune called Hawker are the featured protagonists. It ranges from embarking on dangerous expeditions to locate Mayan ruins deep in the Amazon to tracking the killers who used a biological weapon to kill a US ambassador.

The second one is the Chris Bronson series penned by James Becker. The featured protagonist is Chris Bronson in this historical fiction-oriented series. Basically, this series revolves around ancient tablets, scrolls, and inscriptions which the protagonist chances upon and is assisted by his estranged wife, who is a past master at antique items, to decipher their meanings; they relate to and will make you pause and reconsider the tenets of Christianity. The third one is the Daniel Knox series authored by Will Adams. Daniel Knox, who is a marine archaeologist, is the featured protagonist in this series. Archaeologist Knox is busily exploring various unresolved mysteries dating to ancient times.

Achievements

• Morrison's first book The Noah's Ark Quest (The Ark) was self-published and later published by Simon and Schuster. The Ark (The Noah’s Ark Quest) has been translated into 22 languages, was selected for IndieBound's Indie Next list in May 2010, and became a top 15 bestseller in the United Kingdom.
  
  Boyd is also a professional actor, appearing in films, commercials, and stage plays. In 2003 he fulfilled a lifelong dream and became a Jeopardy! champion.

Works

More photos

• book

  • Rogue Wave

    (A minor seismic disturbance in a remote section of the Pa...)

    2010
  • The Emperor's Revenge

    (When a bank heist during the Monaco Grand Priz decimates ...)

    2016
  • Typhoon Fury

    (Hired to search for a collection of paintings worth half ...)

    2017
  • Shadow Tyrants

    (Nearly two thousand years ago, an Eastern emperor charged...)

    2018
  • Final Option

    (Juan Cabrillo and his team of expert operatives return in...)

    2019
  • Midas Code

    (Top army engineer Tyler Locke is given a mysterious ancie...)

    2011
  • Piranha

    (In 1902, the volcano Mt. Pelée erupts on the island of Ma...)

    2015
  • The Noah's Ark Quest 2010
  • The Roswell Conspiracy 2012
  • The Loch Ness Legacy 2013
  • Substance 2013

Views

Here is what Morrison stated about his own writing process: "I don't have a strict writing schedule. I tend to be more goal-oriented than time-oriented. I spend a lot of pre-writing time on the research so that when I get down to the novel, I have a good idea where it's headed. Then when I'm actually writing that novel, I try to finish a chapter a day (5-6 pages), and I put a cliffhanger at the end of the chapter, which makes it exciting for me to get started the next day. However, even though I do much of my research ahead of time, there's always room for those story epiphanies during the writing process that is like jolts of adrenaline. Sometimes those require rewriting earlier chapters, but they're definitely worth it."

Quotations: "I think I'm best at the action, pacing, and cliffhangers that keep you wanting to stay up reading just one more chapter. As a tradeoff to keep the story moving, I don't spend a lot of time on scene description, just enough to give the reader a sense of place. I want readers to bring their own imaginations into the equation, which means I won't win any awards for a lavish chronicle of the unique settings in my books."

"When I first started writing, my characters were simple folk whose motivations didn’t always make sense. I was more intent on the plot at that point. The revision process let me apply some real-life seasoning to how the characters act and react in the book."

Personality

For non-fiction thrills, Boyd enjoys white water rafting, skiing, scuba diving, and bungee jumping. Boyd is also a professional actor, appearing in films, commercials, and stage plays.

Interests

• traveling, theater

• Sport & Clubs

  rafting, skiing, scuba diving, bungee jumping

Connections

Boyd Morrison is married and currently lives in Seattle with his wife.

co-author:

Clive Cussler

Friend:

Mark Greaney

Friend:

Whitney Terrell

Born on October 3, 1967, he is an American writer and educator from Kansas City, Missouri. Terrell has published three novels and his writing has appeared in Harper's Magazine, Slate, The New York Times, The Washington Post Magazine, and other outlets.

References

• Author's Boyd Morrison Official Website