Derrik Richard was raised in Edwardsville, IL , a town just across the river from St. Louis, Missouri. After majoring in Biology at SIU-E, he went on to obtain a D.M.D. degree at SIU Dental School. When he’s not volunteering time in his church’s youth programs, he is participating in various sports, playing paintball and reading books about history.
Derrik states, “For the past 20 years I’ve contributed countless hours of volunteer work to young people and youth groups. Through these experiences, I observed a growing interest among kids for good, wholesome, adventure/mystery books about characters and environments familiar to themselves. I feel my novel, “Nic Nelson and The Diamonds of Denmark,” adequately meets this need. My book would be the first in a series of stories covering Nic Nelson’s adventures from boyhood to early adolescence. Young readers would grow with Nic and see how he deals with the loss of his father and overcomes life’s obstacles through the love of his mother, a neighborly father figure and the loyalty of his friends.
Readers will also be able to learn and share in some of Nic’s favorite pastimes such as paintball. These stories are also intended to stimulate young readers’ interest in history as each Nic Nelson adventure will have some aspect of history tied into the mystery. Another aspect of the book is how it reflects the diverse makeup of America with the main characters being White, African-American and Asian. Lastly, my book touches on a few of the issues of being a fatherless child. Unfortunately, this seems to be a growing problem but Nic Nelson could give other fatherless kids hope by being someone they could relate and look up to.”