🏆⚔️ THE KNIGHTS WITH NO LORDS IS OFFICIALLY AN AWARD-WINNING NOVEL! I have an announcement to make!
My novel, The Knights with No Lords: The One Called Gawain, has been recognized as a 2026 PenCraft Book Award Winner, receiving 2nd Place in Fiction – Historical Fantasy.
It’s an incredible honor, and one we’re proud to share with the readers who’ve followed Gawain’s adventures and helped introduce this story to the world.
And for those of you discovering The Knights with No Lords for the first time, WELCOME!
This is a story about Gawain a young warrior forged by captivity, war, duty, and blood. He’s forced to choose between his love for Morgan le Fay and his duty to the true heir who carries the hopes of uniting Britannia and bringing an end to an era of war.
Everyone knows the stories of King Arthur and his knights. But long before there was a Round Table, they were something far more dangerous: a generation of gifted, reckless, and hot-blooded young men trying to find their place in a world that was tearing itself apart.
If that sounds like your kind of story, I’d love for you to grab a copy, check it out, be the first to leave an Amazon Review and step into the world.
How many times have you heard someone say something along the lines of:
“The Holy Spirit was telling me to_____” “God told me to ____” “The Spirit placed it on my heart to ____”
I don’t know about you guys, but every time I hear someone use the Holy Spirit as the authority for some decision they made…it scares me. I see these people as potentially dangerous. Because in so many words, they’ve elevated themselves to God himself.
And to oppose their actions or decisions…you run the risk of feeling like you’re going against God.
How do we know if it’s really the Holy Spirit that’s telling you to do things…and it’s not simply your own personal desires, emotions, fears, impulses, or preferences?
Last month, I entered The Knights with No Lords: The One Called Gawain into the Reader Views Literary Awards. The entry included a professional review of the novel, and when the email arrived with the results, I almost didn’t want to believe what I was seeing. Five Stars Baby!!!
The reviewer called the novel:
⚔️ “A modern masterpiece.”
⚔️ “The most glorious prose.”
⚔️ A book with battle scenes written with “a precision rarely seen.”
And then came the line that absolutely floored me:
“Chances are, this will be the best fantasy book you read this year.”
I have so many thoughts about AI when it comes to being an artist, especially as it relates to Hollywood and the publishing industry.
Recently, there were graduations where young graduates booed when the idea of AI came up.
And I get it. I think the reason why they booed was because so many companies and corporations are banking more on AI capabilities than on human beings.
At the same time…I also understand the corporations and companies.
If you have access to a tool that can get you the desired result of an employee, and it costs you pennies on the dollar compared to the yearly salary you’d have to pay that employee…I won’t go so far as to say, “Why wouldn’t you use it?” because I know we’re talking about real people’s jobs and livelihoods here.
But I would say this: they’d be foolish not to at least explore it.
And here’s my attitude about the whole thing. Maybe I’m just a different breed from some of my peers. Maybe it’s just the way I was raised in the 90s when Michael Jordan was dunking on fools and people still embraced the spirit of competition instead of acting like every challenge was some kind of injustice.
But when it comes to AI, I say: Challenge accepted.
It’s really unfortunate, but I don’t think I’ve ever felt this way before.
You ever look forward to something for a long time, only to slowly watch that excitement turn into concern? Then concern turns into dread? Then dread turns into, “You know what? I don’t think I can support this.”
That’s where I am with Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey.
For those who don’t know, Christopher Nolan — the director behind The Dark Knight, Inception, and Oppenheimer — is releasing a film adaptation of Homer’s The Odyssey.
Just hearing that alone should be enough to build excitement.
The story of The Odyssey is already epic. You have Odysseus, king of Ithaca, trying to return home after the Trojan War. You have monsters, gods, temptation, shipwrecks, death, longing, loyalty, wisdom, and the brutal cost of survival. Combine that with the director of The Dark Knight and Oppenheimer, and it sounds like a no-brainer.
It sounds like, “Shut up and take my money.”
But then, little by little, you start hearing about the choices being made. The smile fades. The excitement dampens. Interest turns into disgust. Anticipation turns into apprehension.
When churches become so focused on attracting the world that they forget to strengthen the saints…
I recently came across a video on YouTube called “Why I Still Reject Popular Christianity,” and I wanted to share it because it expresses something I’ve been thinking about for a while when it comes to seeker churches, popular megachurches, and modern-day evangelism.
I don’t plan on saying a whole lot in this essay. I mostly want to highlight the video and explain why I agree with so much of what it says.
But I do think this subject touches on a larger issue that many Christians are noticing, especially when we talk about why so many men seem disconnected from modern church culture.
Here’s a question…if you met another Christian who you see if living a life separate from the world, he prays and believes that Jesus died for our sins…but he has a different opinion on the details, like whether he died on a cross or an upright stake…why would it be so important to you to change their mind?
Something I’m beginning to tolerate less and less of, is Christians who make declarative statements as a matter of facts…when the Bible doesn’t explicitly state the claim they’re making.
What they’re actually doing is declaring their interpretation of the Scriptures as facts. But an interpretation is an opinion. An opinion can be wrong.
One of the greatest things I heard a pastor say was, “It’s not my job to get you to follow me. It’s my job to get you to follow Jesus!”
You’re about to hear the words of a natural born rebel. I know the word “rebel” might discredit this essay, because the Bible doesn’t usually call someone a rebel in a positive light.
But I posit…that if you call yourself a Christian, a true believer and a follower of Christ…then, believe it or not…you are actually rebelling. You’re rebelling against Satan and this wicked system of things.
And as a Man who’s read the entire Bible now twice, I’ve acknowledged that it’s going to be next to impossible to find a single church where I agree with their theology 100%…but if it’s just 95%…I can manage and hang around.
This is a sensitive subject for me to admit because I wasn’t raised to make excuses. If I fail…the last thing I ever want is to say is, it’s because the system is rigged against me. Sounds like a cop-out, an excuse to make you feel better for your own lack of talent, determination, or ability.
But…now that it’s 2026 and becoming a best-seller isn’t my “everything” the way it used to be, I think it’s about time to speak up on an issue I’ve known for well over ten years.
With the exception of Non-Fiction Books (think self-help, biographies, books on religion, politics, and psychology, etc) the Book Publishing Industry favors Female Authors and is biased Against Men.
Some of you already know this, but there are those who don’t and those who deny it. I’m talking to those people.
