Martin StephensA retired South African advocate, entrepreneur, and former parliamentarian. First elected to Parliament as a member of the then opposition party in 1970. At 24 years old, he was at that time the youngest MP ever elected since the formation of the Unin in 1910. He left Parliament in 1974 but remained active in politics and served as the Transvaal leader of the New Republic Party from 1980. He re-entered Parliament in 2004 as the Finance Spokesperson and a member of the Standing Committee on Public Accounts (SCOPA). He graduated with a BA (Law and Political Science) from the University of the Witwatersrand and practiced law for 10 years as an advocate of the Supreme Court. This included a stint of three years as a senior state advocate in the Office of the Attorney General of the then Transvaal province. He entered the business world as an entrepreneur in 1982. Being fascinated by finance, banking, and trading, he qualified as a US futures and options trader in November 2001, then authored five books on trading with futures and options in business and investment settings. In 2006 he was named Best Student in the program in Economics and Public Finance of the University of South Africa (UNISA). In 2017, he obtained a PhD in Development Studies from the University of the Western Cape and in 2019 passed "Social Anthropology: An Introduction 2," from Oxford University.Though not by any means a special forces veteran, he received related training as a young Army officer during his compulsory military service, attaining the rank of lieutenant. He uses elements from all his experience to construct his stories. When he describes a place or a setting, he's been there.Although writing pure fiction, the story revolves around the very clear and present threat to Western civilization from extremists of all stripes Read More Read Less