By Darrin Matthew Peppers
Twenty Years…
People often ask me,
“How long did it take you to write Caleb & Bastet?”
The honest answer?
That depends on where you start.
If you’re asking about the first published novel…
Almost twenty years.
If you’re asking about the world itself…
It feels like I’ve been building it my entire life.
It Started With One Story
Some of the earliest concepts that eventually became Caleb & Bastet.
Back in 2009, I sat down with an idea that refused to leave me alone.
It wasn’t just another book.
It was a world.
A world of hidden history.
Ancient mysteries.
Forgotten civilizations.
Guardian spirits.
Secret organizations.
And a young man named Caleb Reinhart who always felt like the world around him wasn’t what it appeared to be.
At the time, I never imagined it would grow into multiple novels, companion series, documentaries, websites, lore, Coincidence Files, or an entire universe.
I simply wanted to tell a story.
For myself.
For my daughter.
And for my mother.
My First Reader
My mother loved books.
She finished a new novel almost every week.
Growing up, she taught me that stories weren’t just entertainment.
They became places people returned to throughout their lives.
Whenever I finished another chapter of Caleb & Bastet, I’d send it to her.
We’d talk about the characters.
The mysteries.
The plot.
Where the story might go next.
Those conversations became some of my favorite memories.
I had no idea how important they would eventually become.
The Hardest Book Was Book One
Three complete manuscripts were ultimately shelved before I finally found the right beginning.
Ironically…
The first book became the hardest book to write.
Not because I didn’t know where the story was going…
But because I knew too many places it could go.
I rewrote it again.
And again.
And again.
At least ten different versions.
Then came one of the hardest decisions I’ve ever made as a writer.
I shelved three complete manuscripts that followed Caleb from childhood through the age of eighteen.
Those stories weren’t bad.
They simply weren’t the right beginning.
Instead of forcing them into the novel, I saved the best moments and turned them into flashbacks throughout the series.
Looking back…
It was one of the best decisions I ever made.
The Advice That Changed Everything
One day, after hearing me complain about Book One for what felt like the hundredth time, my mother smiled and said something I’ll never forget.
“If you don’t know how to begin… write the ending.” – My Mother
Then she added:
“You keep telling me you know how the story ends, so why not start there and work your way back?”
It sounded completely backwards.
So I tried it.
Everything changed.
Instead of forcing Book One…
I started writing the books that came later.
Suddenly the universe opened up.
Characters found their voices.
Relationships became stronger.
Mysteries connected.
Entire storylines finally made sense because I already knew where they were leading.
Before cancer took my mother from us, she unknowingly gave me the advice that finally unlocked the story I’d been chasing for years.
Every book I’ve written since carries a piece of her wisdom.
Then Life Changed
Losing my eyesight changed the way I wrote—but not why I wrote.
Just as the series was finally coming together…
My own life changed.
I suffered a detached retina and completely lost vision in one eye.
Then a severe cataract developed in my remaining functional eye.
Eventually I lost my insurance.
Doctors recommended surgery.
But life had other plans.
Around the same time, my daughter was hospitalized.
As a single father raising a daughter with special needs, every dollar mattered.
I had a choice.
Pay for surgery…
Or make sure my daughter had what she needed.
I chose my daughter.
Every time.
I still haven’t had the surgery and I only have 10% vision in my remaining eye.
Learning To Write Again
At that point I had two choices.
Quit.
Or adapt.
Failure wasn’t an option.
So I built an entirely new way to write.
Almost every morning before sunrise, I’d head into the Florida Everglades.
I’d spend hours walking.
Thinking.
Talking.
Dictating entire chapters into my phone using voice-to-text.
Conversations.
Action scenes.
Ideas.
Entire worlds spoken beneath the trees.
Then I’d return home.
My editor would send chapters back with revisions.
I couldn’t simply sit down and read them.
Instead…
I’d connect my computer to a large television.
Turn on Microsoft Word’s Read Aloud feature.
Listen to every sentence.
Then dictate my corrections back into the manuscript one line at a time.
It was slower.
Far slower.
But the story kept moving.
Technology didn’t replace my imagination.
It helped me continue using it.
This Was Never Just One Book
People often see Recognition and assume that’s where the journey begins.
In reality…
It’s only the doorway.
While Book One took years to finally solve, I continued building the universe around it.
Today, multiple novels and companion series already exist in various stages of completion.
Some are nearly finished.
Others continue to grow.
Together they represent nearly twenty years spent building one connected fictional universe.
My dream was never to write one book.
It was to create a world readers could keep coming back to.
Real Life Lives Inside The Fiction
One of the questions I’m asked most often is:
“Are any of the characters based on real people?”
The answer is…
Absolutely.
Bastet is inspired by my own cat, KitKat, whose personality, curiosity, and quiet confidence became the foundation for one of the most important characters in the series.
Sekhmet was inspired by another beloved cat named Cutie.
In October 2025, Cutie’s life was tragically cut short by an intentional act of cruelty. Losing her was heartbreaking, but I wanted a part of her to live on forever. Every time readers meet Sekhmet, they’ll also be meeting the memory of a cat who meant the world to me.
Many of the guardian cats throughout the series were inspired by animals that have shared my life over the years. Each one carries a little piece of a real companion who left a lasting mark on my heart.
Ervin Reinhart carries my grandfather’s name because I wanted a part of him to live inside the story forever.
Growing up in Washington State also shaped this series in countless ways. The mountains, forests, small towns, and mysteries woven throughout Caleb & Bastet are rooted in places I actually explored, people I met, and experiences that stayed with me long after I left.
Some stories begin with imagination.
Others begin with memory.
For me…
They’ve always been intertwined.
What I Use To Create My Own Makreting Materials..
Every now and then someone comments online that I use AI.
They’re right.
I do.
What they don’t see are the twenty years that came before it.
The sketches.
The notebooks.
The rewrites.
The sleepless nights.
The long walks.
The shelved manuscripts.
The years spent trying to solve one story.
AI didn’t create Caleb & Bastet.
It helped me continue building a world after losing much of my eyesight.
Every image still begins with an idea.
Every character still begins with a description.
Every mystery still begins with a blank page.
The imagination has always been mine.
The technology simply gave me another way to bring it to life.
I use heypocket, and my phone to dictate. I create all my own marketing material, such as the psots you see on social media. I started out by creating a template in photoship or Canva. Once I have a template I bring that over to Ai to animate my own drawings and graphics I create. But its not over there….then I need to use a recorded voice from a subsribtion website where I use real life actors. I take those voices and ai video then I head over to Powerdirector and splice the video, the sound effects, then once it lines up, I produce it into a video form. From there I desice upon what the title should be, description, and even hahstags. This process brings you the entertainment you see online. I do hope you appreciate it, becasue I can barely see and need to sit in front of the computer at a close range.
Looking Forward
Today, Recognition is finally ready to meet readers.
But this isn’t the end of a twenty-year journey.
It’s the beginning of a much larger one.
There are still countless mysteries waiting beneath the surface.
More books.
More characters.
More adventures.
More secrets waiting to be uncovered.
And I can’t wait to share them with you.
One Last Thought
People often confuse eyesight with vision.
I’ve learned they’re not the same thing.
I lost much of my eyesight.
I never lost my vision.
Thank you for being part of this journey.
Welcome to the world of Caleb & Bastet.
