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Like almost everyone else, I've had my fifteen minutes of local fame – maybe a bit more I produced and arranged over 50 commercially released pop and rock n' roll records. You can still hear a lot of them on YouTube. Back in 1969-71, I participated in three hit records, “Do Your Thing,” “Love Land,” and “Express Yourself.” Instead of being a “one-hit wonder,” The Watts 103rd Street Rhythm Band was a three hit wonder. After three great years at Los Angeles' Hamilton High School, I went on to UCLA, which cost only $68 a semester back then. I took my law degree from UCLA 1965 and passed the Bar in December of that year. 56 years later, I'm still practicing law.
I served as a Judge Advocate (Captain) in the U.S. Air Force, first at Luke Air Force Base, Arizona and then in Ankara, Turkey, where I lived for two years. In order to get over a perceived fear of flying, I learned to fly and flew my own private plane for 12 years. I acted in and/or directed more than 15 plays and musicals in community theaters. I survived a heart scare, three cancer scares, and a minor stroke. In addition to traveling to all 50 states, Lorraine and I have probably seen more countries than most people have seen counties. If I won or settled a big case – and there have been some quite large ones – it might hit a few newspapers in various places. I “semi-retired” in 1996 to open a cookbook publishing company. When the company went bust five years later, I had lost more money than I ever knew existed. I returned to law practice, and was fortunate enough during the next 16 years to pay most of that money back.
Although I started writing in 1989, and published ten nonfiction books in the U.S., my next “career,” that of a novelist, did not catch fire until 2005, when I was published for 13 years by Dekel Publishing House / Samuel Wachtmann's Sons of Israel, before buying back my copyrights and starting Pangaea Publishing Group in 2018. Sixteen of my novels have been published. One of them, Scribe, went to #2 on the Portuguese bestseller list, and Against All Odds, Assassin, Amazing Grace, The Wrecking Crew, The Deathmaster, and The Legacy Saga (four volumes thus far) have done extraordinarily well. My books have been translated into Portuguese, Czech, Turkish, German, and Hebrew.
No big deal. None of it. Lots have people have accomplished what I have. A far greater number of achieved much more.
My greatest accomplishment was the discovery that when I devoted my life to “whatever it takes to make my most beloved one happy,” doing what it takes to repair the world, and trying to bring what happiness I could into a fractured world, I learned the real secret of what life is all about. Together, Lorraine and I have raised five wonderful and adult children (two of mine, three of hers). We have six grandchildren – the smartest and most beautiful grandchildren everyone has ever had (of course).
I've learned that I am simply a tiny cog in an infinite wheel, the smallest stitch in the web of life, neither more nor less important than anyone else on earth. If you're looking for great drama, you won't find it here. I believe I am the happiest and luckiest man in the world, primarily because of the most loving and perfect marriage to my Lorraine, South Africa's greatest export – a master teacher who has had – and continues to have – such a positive influence on the lives of so many hundreds of children, including ours.
February 2022
BIOGRAPHY
Hugo N. (“Hugh”) Gerstl