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Biblical Clarity
Sacred Sexuality offers readers a raw testimony and a Scripture-centered call to return to God’s design for sex, identity, and holiness. This book blends testimony with teaching. How did you decide how much of your personal story to share?
As I’ve led Sacred Sexuality workshops and spoken publicly about God’s design for sexuality, people often asked if I would write a book that fully detailed my testimony and life journey. I previously shared portions of that journey in a public letter on my website, titled In Error to God’s Heir. That letter included deeply personal experiences—my father’s alcoholism, my parents’ divorce, the challenges my mother faced as a single parent, experiences of sexual abuse, and other formative wounds. While many readers found it helpful, it also brought tension within my family, and I eventually edited out certain details in pursuit of peace.
When it came time to write the book Sacred Sexuality, I sensed the Holy Spirit leading me in a different direction. Rather than centering the book on my full autobiography, I was called to focus on God’s revelation—His design for sexuality, identity, holiness, and redemption. My story is present, but it serves as a witness, not the foundation. Scripture is the foundation. My testimony is woven throughout.
I wanted to write a book that would speak truth and grace into a culture increasingly confused and wayward about sexuality—a book that helps readers understand what God’s Word actually says, how people drift into sexual sin, the cultural lies that deceive people, how freedom is found, and how believers can walk alongside others with both conviction and compassion. That is how Sacred Sexuality came to be.
Was there a specific verse or passage that you feel “cracked something open” for you spiritually?
Yes—Jesus’ words in Matthew 7:21–23 were deeply unsettling to me: “Many will say to Me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not done mighty works in your name… and then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness.’” I remember asking myself, honestly, Would that be me?
That question drove me to study everything Jesus said about sexuality and the heart. In Matthew 5:27–30, Jesus makes it unmistakably clear that sexual sin is not merely about behavior, but about the heart—desire, intent, and obedience. Later, in Matthew 15:19–20, He explains that sexual immorality flows from within and that these sins defile a person.
The apostle Paul reinforces this sobering truth in 1 Corinthians 6:9–11 with a clear warning: “Do not be deceived…” Sexual sin—like all unrepentant sin—separates us from the kingdom of God. But Paul doesn’t stop there. He proclaims the gospel hope: “And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ.”
That verse became deeply personal to me. For such was I. And by God’s grace, that is no longer who I am.
Much of the book wrestles with identity—who we are versus who God calls us to be. How did your understanding of identity shift over time?
As I immersed myself in Scripture, I began to see that God’s Word is remarkably consistent about sexual immorality—and equally consistent about redemption. My identity is not defined by my desires, temptations, past experiences, or labels given by culture.
Scripture tells us plainly that the human heart is deceitful (Jeremiah 17:9), and Jesus confirms that sexual sin flows from the heart (Matthew 15:19–20). But Scripture also tells us that Christ demonstrated His love for us while we were still sinners (Romans 5:8). His grace is not theoretical—it is powerful and sufficient (2 Corinthians 12:9).
One passage that profoundly reshaped my understanding of identity is 1 Corinthians 6:19–20: “You are not your own… You were bought at a price.” Our bodies matter to God. They are sacred because Christ paid for us with His own blood. In response, Romans 12:1–2 calls us to present ourselves as living sacrifices—transformed, not conformed.
My identity is no longer rooted in who I was or what I felt, but in who Christ is and what He has done.
Some readers may find your confidence reassuring, while others may find it challenging. How did you think about your audience while writing?
I wrote Sacred Sexuality for readers who are hungry for biblical clarity in a confusing cultural moment—and for those who long to see that clarity delivered with grace. Pastors, parents, and believers who feel overwhelmed or silenced by cultural debates will find firm convictions, careful Scripture, and practical guidance.
For readers seeking a biblical sexual ethic, this book is meant to function as a roadmap—and perhaps even a lifeline. And for those who are questioning, searching, or carrying deep pain around sexuality, my prayer is that they encounter not condemnation, but the steady, redemptive voice of God’s Word. Truth and grace are not enemies. In Christ, they meet.
This book is ultimately an invitation to repentance, to freedom, and to the life that only God’s design can give. To book is to bring God glory; none to me.
Launch dates for Sacred Sexuality:
February 10: Ebook
February 24: Printed book
Author Links: GoodReads | TikTok | Instagram | Facebook | Website | Amazon
Sacred Sexuality: Grace and Truth Revealed in a Culture of Confusion equips believers to anchor their lives in God’s sacred design for sexuality and identity. Author Mark Richard—once trapped in decades of sexual sin and confusion—shares his personal testimony alongside timeless biblical truth and pastoral guidance. With both bold conviction and tender compassion, he addresses cultural lies, confronts temptation, and provides practical tools for living in purity and grace. Readers will discover how to: understand God’s purpose for sexuality, resist the enemy’s schemes, speak truth in love, and walk in freedom through Christ. Ideal for individuals, families, pastors, small groups, and church leaders, this resource offers clarity, compassion, and hope for one of the most critical issues of our time.
The Funniest Joke in the Universe
Santa Andreas’ The Funniest Joke in the Universe follows Nardwuar, a kid who blows out his fifth-birthday candles and secretly wishes to know the single funniest joke that exists, then spends years trying to live up to that wish. His search drags him from a very normal childhood into very abnormal territory: alien parking lots run by bitter “perfect human” robots, a ramshackle space camper called The Absurdipity, a quantum banana that doubles as a lifeline, and a mountain retreat on planet Hoodoogooroo where a Joke Guru and, later, a cosmic voice called The Great Whatever poke holes in everything he thinks he knows about comedy, art, and himself. Along the way, the book weaves in the origin fable of Anana the Banana and her friend Miki the Monkey, two misfits who discover that imagination is both a curse and a gift, and it all builds to the wonderfully absurd idea that the funniest joke in the universe might be a joke so good it does not even need a punchline.
As a reader, I had a goofy grin on my face for most of the ride. The writing swings from cheap fart jokes to sneaky philosophy in the space of a paragraph, and that contrast worked for me. Scenes like the birthday wish, the hellish hot-dog dream that births the sausage joke, and the long bureaucratic slog with Surly the Perfect Human robot clerk feel ridiculous on the surface, yet underneath they echo things readers recognize from real life, like humiliation, boredom, and the feeling that grown-up rules are made to crush your curiosity.
I loved the voice most of all. It is conversational, self-mocking, full of running gags and made-up words, the kind of narration that sounds like a funny friend telling a story at lunch and constantly interrupting himself with side comments. The illustrations match that energy, bold images of sausages, bananas, aliens, and a very tired campervan, and they keep the book feeling playful even when the ideas go a bit cosmic.
The book leans into riffing, so some bits feel like extended stand-up routines rather than steps forward in the story, and I feel that some younger readers might lose the thread in the longer tangents. The constant joking also means that a few emotional beats never sink in as deeply as they could. On the other hand, the finale with The Great Whatever pulled everything back together for me. The conversation about a joke that is “too good to laugh at” and the idea that something is funny because we decide to treat it like a joke, just like art is art because an artist says so, gave the book a surprising weight, and I closed the last pages feeling weirdly moved, not just amused.
I would recommend The Funniest Joke in the Universe to readers who like oddball stories from roughly upper-middle-grade through adult who enjoy silly humor spiked with big questions, people who like Douglas-Adams-style cosmic nonsense, kids who live on wordplay and doodles, and grownups who still remember what it felt like to chase laughs in order to feel seen. If you are open to a wild, illustrated romp that turns a quest for the ultimate joke into a reflection on imagination, belonging, and why we want people to laugh with us in the first place, this book is worth the trip.
Pages: 360 | ASIN : B0G3KMP56X
The Legacy of the Twins Platoon
The Legacy of the Twins Platoon follows a group of young Minnesotans who enlist together in the Marine Corps at a Minnesota Twins game in 1967 and then get swept into some of the hardest fighting of the Vietnam War, from Khe Sanh and Hue City to Dai Do and the DMZ. The book is split into life before Vietnam, brutal combat tours in-country, and the long shadow of the war afterward, including PTSD, broken marriages, suicides, and quiet acts of resilience that play out over decades. Author Christy Sauro Jr writes as one of them and tracks down the stories of his fellow Marines and their families, so the story stretches from their teenage years to their later lives as aging veterans who still carry the weight of what happened. It ends up as both a unit history and a long, painful look at what the war did to a particular slice of America.
I found the book to be surprisingly intimate and straightforward. Sauro’s style is plainspoken and very visual, and he leans on short scenes and dialogue rather than high drama. The boot camp sections and early combat chapters move fast and feel almost like you are standing on the yellow footprints, getting barked at, then shoved into the red mud around Khe Sanh and Dai Do. The moment when Wallace “Skip” Schmidt describes the rifle being shot out of his hands and then whispers that everyone he knows is dead hit me in the gut, because Sauro lets the scene sit there with minimal commentary. Sometimes the level of detail can feel overwhelming, with name after name and battle after battle, and I caught myself having to flip back to remember who was who. That said, the repetition also mirrors what he is trying to show: a grinding series of patrols, firefights, and losses that blur together for the men who lived it. It is not a sleek literary war memoir, and I ended up liking that roughness, because it feels honest to the world he is describing.
What stayed with me even more than the combat was the moral and emotional through-line. Sauro is obsessed with what the country asked of these teenagers and what it gave them back in return. The homecoming scenes are almost harder to read than the firefights. Larry Jones getting smashed in the face with a beer bottle in a bar, then realizing that everyone is staring at him like he is the problem, not the guy who hit him, made me angry in a very immediate way. The chapters on PTSD and suicide are bleak and careful at the same time. Sauro walks through how men like Schmidt fell apart in the years after the war and how the term “post-traumatic stress disorder” arrived too late to help some of them or their families. The big idea here is not just that war is hell, which we all know in the abstract, but that the real cost keeps showing up in family kitchens and quiet Midwestern streets long after the shooting stops. I could feel his frustration with how slowly institutions moved and how much of the heavy lifting fell on spouses, siblings, and parents who were trying to understand what had happened to their sons.
I would recommend The Legacy of the Twins Platoon to readers of military history who want something rooted in lived experience rather than strategy charts, to younger people who have only heard the Vietnam War reduced to slogans, and to policymakers and professionals who work with veterans today. The book does exactly what a legacy should do. It keeps these Marines and their families from being reduced to a line in a textbook, and it holds up both their courage and their pain in a way that is hard to shake.
Pages: 410 | ISBN : 978-1663271556
IMPACT: Your Ultimate Playbook for Life
IMPACT: Your Ultimate Playbook for Life led by Shar Moore feels like a glossy, curated “playbook for life” that you can dip into at random and still get something out of it. It is built like a coffee table collection, with short pieces from a wide mix of contributors. The chapters rotate through big themes like mastery, achievement, perseverance, inspiration, transformation, and creation, so the book reads more like a series of sharp snapshots than one long story. Along the way, it also pauses for a dedicated special feature on Destiny Rescue and the fight against child exploitation, which shifts the mood in a serious, gut-level way.
On the writing side, I liked the variety. It kept me awake. It kept me turning pages. Some entries are warm and chatty, like a friend telling you what they learned the hard way. The money piece from Rae Brent is a good example. It is plainspoken and kind of blunt, in a good way. It says the “boring” habits matter, and it does not pretend discipline is glamorous. I also appreciated the book’s confidence in its own vibe. The “golden thread” idea sets a hopeful tone, and the whole thing is clearly designed to be picked up, put down, and picked up again. The mix of voices gives the book real texture. Some pages were emotional while others act like a gentle boost, the kind of uplifting wallpaper you do not overthink but still enjoy. It keeps the tone fresh, and it lets different ideas land in different ways.
The ideas land best when they get specific. I felt that in the pieces about being a “safe space” for people, and choosing your impact with intention. And then the Destiny Rescue section comes in and, honestly, it jolts you. The story of the girl known as “Number 231” is haunting, and it makes the word impact stop being a slogan. The stats are emotionally stirring, too. Millions exploited, huge money involved, and children stuck inside those numbers. I also respected that the book shares practical details about how rescues happen, not just feel-good lines. Raids, covert work, border monitoring, plus real outcomes reported for 2023. It left me sad, then angry, then hopeful.
I see IMPACT as a high-energy sampler platter. It is best for readers who like quick hits of perspective, personal stories, and mindset nudges, plus a few moments that get genuinely real. I would recommend it to entrepreneurs, leaders, coaches, and anyone who enjoys reflective reading in small bites. It also works great as a gift book. The design-forward format helps. Last but certainly not least, the book’s design and layout are beautiful, exactly what you want from a coffee table book that’s going to catch someone’s eye. If you want a book that you can open anywhere and still find a spark, this one delivers.
Pages: 256 | ISBN : 978-1764037471
Burgeoning Romance
Terra Lux centers around a family swept up in the evacuation of their planet, forced into servitude, and struggling to find solace in a brutal existence. What was the inspiration for the setup of your story?
I really wanted to explore what was next for our trio, and I wanted to reunite them with a character from an earlier book, Soren. Soren is a potential future love interest for Sev, and we see their relationship develop over the course of this book and the next. I was really interested in exploring how this family would stay together if they lost their home…how they would struggle and triumph in an alien environment.
What is the most rewarding aspect of writing a trilogy for young adult readers?
Meeting and connecting with readers, whether in person or on social media. The best thing about a YA audience is the scope of it. You really do connect with a wide variety of people and age groups, and it’s very rewarding.
What were some themes that were important for you to explore in this book?
Loss, resilience, and triumph over tragedy. I wanted to explore a slow-burning, burgeoning romance, too, and I got to tease that a little with Sev and Soren.
Are you currently working on a new series? What can we look forward to seeing from you next?
I’m actually working on a continuation of this universe, with books four and five coming at a later date. It’s more of an intimate, character-driven exploration of the world I’ve created for them.
Author Links: GoodReads | X (Twitter) | Facebook | Linktree | Website | Amazon
Sev has lost her home before. She’s learned how to survive,how to fight, how to run. But when war sweeps across Dobani, there’s nowhere left to go—only forward.As the world crumbles, Sev clings to the people she loves most.
Through storm and silence, danger and displacement, she must forge a new path in a galaxy that keeps trying to break her. But Sev is done running. This time, she’s ready to decide who she wants to become.
The final book in the Terra trilogy is a story of survival, resilience, and found family—where even in the darkest times, a light remains.
Fresh, Funny Ideas
The Adventures of Mo follows a curious dog who finds a key in the forest and decides to go on an adventure, traveling across all 50 US states to try to return it to its owner, making new friends along the way. What sparked the idea for Mo and his cross-country adventure?
The original inspiration behind The Adventures of Mo was to honor our beloved family dog, Mozart, after we lost him to cancer. As a retired journalist/writer, I used my skills to convert my grief into a playful adventure for kids, one that turns discovery about the US–its land, people, and places–into smart fun. Mo’s focus is on learning US geography through stories, not memorization.
The book has laugh-out-loud moments alongside quieter, thoughtful ones. How did you strike that balance?
I had to unfocus so I could focus. I unfocused by talking long walks, swimming, and even vacuuming! This is when I developed story ideas along with balanced laugh-out-loud and thoughtful moments. My mind had to be clear to make room for fresh, funny ideas.
How did you decide which facts to include without making it feel like a lesson?
I dug deep into every state to uncover fun facts that kids may not learn in the classroom. That research became the backdrop for each story, creating learning opportunities for readers without them realizing it. Mo complements classroom lessons about US geography and can also prompt fun conversations around the dinner table.
What kind of curiosity do you hope this story sparks in young readers?
To encourage readers–regardless of age–to wonder about the different people who live in this country, where they live, how they live, or simply to learn more facts about US states that might surprise them. Mo can help them imagine a world beyond their own backyard or neighborhood.
Author Links: GoodReads | Facebook | Website | Amazon
The Concept of Rhythm
I Can Play Drums breaks rhythm into simple, playful steps—listening, feeling the beat, relaxing your grip, and having fun—making it the perfect starting point for nervous beginners of any age. What do beginners misunderstand most about rhythm when they first start?
Kids see a drummer in action, mostly in staged videos, looking cool as whirling sticks and playing all over the place, then hound parents to buy them a drum kit, as they are now inspired.
The new kit arrives, a box of bits and pieces with no assembly instructions; the new kid drummer and parents have to work out how it pieces together with an unhealthy belief that everything on the internet is the Bible.
Once the kit is in some playable form, they then start to try to work out how to be like that cool drummer as seen on videos, fail to do so, and are unable to resist the temptation to just bash away, hoping something musical comes out, and learn bad habits.
Parents gasp at the cost of good tuition, as the kit sits in the corner collecting dust after finding lessons of playing single and double strokes all boring and repetitive (unbeknownst to them that is what and how that cool drummer learned and plays).
To add, many books on drumming after the initial pages of basic beats turn into daunting exercises. Not all, though, a good progressive one to mention is the Carmine Appice Realistic Rock. There is a gap in providing an initial guide to point someone new to drumming in the right direction, hence an attempt in writing I Can Play Drums, to hopefully provide some assistance.
The kit eventually is for sale due to a lack of interest after finding it all too hard, a shame, as with a good start and mind engaged in the concept of rhythm and how it works, there is then a chance to enjoy drumming, and what it brings with perseverance.
Once a learner can gather the basics and start playing rhythms, the immense world of drumming opens to them.
What’s the one piece of gear advice you wish every new drummer would hear first?
To play drums, there is no need to spend a lot of money on equipment. A drummer has all they need with two hands, two feet, and their head in the right place. Then, to prove me wrong, there is the band Def Leppard’s drummer, Rick Allen, who plays with no left arm.
The addition of a pair of drumsticks and a practice pad (a piece of a flat rubber sheet), then drums can be practiced anywhere.
Should anyone venture into a big-name rockstar drummer’s dressing room pre a stage show, they are likely to find the drummer warming up, playing his sticks on a practice pad.
There is also the question of what drummers should not hear. Please invest in hearing protection and use it.
What would you say to someone holding drumsticks for the first time and feeling unsure?
To read I Can Play Drums, taking note about grip on sticks to be so loose so that the drumsticks do the work as they naturally rebound, it is no secret, as this method is proven by many great drummers, such as examples Tiger Bill Meligari, Jo Jo Mayer, as well as most likely any corps drummer.
By playing with a controlled grip, problems of limiting playing ability and the risk of injuring the body are reduced considerably. Many drummers who play hard with a stiff grip end up with carpal tunnel issues, as well as foot issues for those who, by default, slam the pedal into the head. It is good to know about this at the commencement of drumming rather than later.
Another thing is to learn and play slowly to one’s own ability. Speed, power, and the flashy stuff that initially inspired them to take up the drums all come in time with plenty of practice.
Drumming is a very physical thing to do, learn to hold the sticks correctly, as well as placing and playing the feet correctly, and yes, you can play drums, well.
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