Mark Andrew Beach

Mark has spent much of his 30-year finance and accounting career writing technical reports for his corporate audiences. Even though he has been a prolific writer of reports, analysis and strategic business plans, this is his first real attempt at a novel. However, because he is such a natural story teller, and he gets at least one new book idea almost every day, he has plans for many more books. He'll tell you he wants to become the next 'Og Mandino'.

Mark enjoys reading historical fiction, inspirational,faith-promoting books, and the occasional thriller, as well as being a movie buff in similar genres. He tries to squeeze them in between the on-going demands of his investment banking and business consulting practice, his family and community.

Mark is a graduate of Oregon State University, a former CPA and corporate executive with several Fortune 100 companies. He currently lives on the side of a mountain in a small town high in the Rocky Mountains. He is married to SherLynne, whom he adores and is the father of eleven children, of whom he is well pleased, and grandfather to nearly twelve beautiful babies.

Onward Christmas Soldiers - The events surrounding Mark getting a GI Joe as his favorite toy for his seventh birthday and then sending it to a missionary on an Indian reservation are true. So are the events related to Christian, his son, with whom he shares his experience years later. Many of the events involving the soldiers in training, Vietnam and as POW's are also based on the true experiences of Mark's family members and stories of others who were really there. The rest is mostly fiction designed to encapsulate the lessons learned in a dramatic and touching way.