The first sparks of The Stillness Series came from four unforgettable images Richard Lee Ferguson could never shake: a fallen North Vietnamese soldier with Rousseau’s Confessions in his rucksack, a Vietnamese woman giving birth in the mud, a terrified orangutan clutching her baby during a firefight, and a later rereading of Homer’s Iliad.

His imagination had been shaped even earlier by stories of China told by his father, a Marine officer who served there in the 1940s. That early fascination deepened into a life’s work. Ferguson later served in Vietnam, spending nearly a year in the jungle fighting the Viet Cong, the North Vietnamese Army, and malaria. What he saw there did not leave him.

After the war, Ferguson earned a Master’s Degree in Asian Studies, learned to speak, read, and write Chinese, built businesses in Asia, and became a lawyer. He practiced international law, advised companies on global strategy, lectured on Asian culture and business law, traveled widely in Asia, and participated in seminars in Vietnam and China for business and government
leaders.

He now lives deep in the forests of Northern California. Retired from his professional career and from teaching Advanced Placement history, science, literature, government, economics, and psychology to gifted high school students, he continues to write about war, consciousness, evolution, and the fate of the human species. The Stillness Series grows out of a lifetime of study, travel, reflection, and firsthand encounter with war.