Photo courtesy of Jason Myrick.
Jason Myrick works as SWAT commander for the Shelby County Sheriff’s Office’s TacticalResponse Unit and also as dayshift patrol commander. He wrote his Arklight trilogy series in less than four years.
It was in 2015 when the idea for a book series came to Jason Myrick, although the concept had always been in his head.
“Being a former Marine, doing what we do in SWAT stuff, I would just have these random thoughts like what a modern day and modernly equipped group of soldiers would be able to do against the Nazis, and that’s where it started,” Myrick said.
By day, Myrick is a lieutenant and dayshift patrol commander with the Shelby County Sheriff’s Office and the Tactical Response Unit (TRU) commander. The law enforcement officer can now add author to his resume, having published three books in his Arklight series over a three-year period.
When describing the category of his writings, Myrick said there’s no place it can exist. It’s a mix of thriller, suspense, military action, Christian, time travel and science fiction all packed into one book. He said his books created their own kind of genre and had reviews stating, “It’s a mashup unlike nothing else.”
The concept was a story about a group of modern-day soldiers who were from a line of warriors seeking to do right, while also broken in their own ways. They had existed in secrecy for some time and went on a mission that took an unexpected turn when the omnipresence of God is revealed.
Myrick discussed his plans with a co-worker who was also a published author. He told his friend he wasn’t a writer, and his friend’s response was, “You need to become one.”
Not one to start something and not finish it, Myrick said he knew it would be a major commitment to write a book. Putting the book together, researching, writing and editing and rewriting would be a monumental task, but once he got his head around the fact he was going to do it, he never looked back.
“I sat down and lamented for a few weeks and said I’d give it a shot,” Myrick said. “Within 40 days, I had 80,000 words. The whole book was basically written in 45 days, and I don’t know how or where it came from. I feel like there was a presence there driving me to get the story out.”
Myrick, a self-proclaimed history buff, still had to do a great deal of research to make the story work to be as real as he could possibly make it. For the book’s main character, John, Myrick pulled from the things he would do, both physically and spiritually.
“In law enforcement, I try to live to a higher standard and want to be better and do the right thing,” he said. “That’s the basis for him in the book.”
The Arklight series began with “Operation Nightfall” (2017), followed by “Forced Interdiction” and finally, “Task Force Crusader.” Myrick describes them as a “classic battle between good and evil for the soul and humanity of man.”
Myrick, a resident of Brook Highland, has been a police officer his entire adult life. He began his career in the Marine Corps military police, then worked on the special reaction team for the Marine Corps for several years before he began working at the Birmingham and Pelham police departments. He has been with the Shelby County Sheriff’s Department for 14 years.
With the series complete, Myrick plans to take a break from writing and focus on his job. He is scheduled to attend the FBI National Academy for three months of training in September in Quantico, Virginia.
“You have to be selected by our agency head, and it’s one of those things only a handful of people get to do,” he said. “That honor will be by far one of the coolest things I’ve ever done. As for what the future holds after that, we’ll see.”
Writing has given Myrick the ability to be a better administrator and communicator. He said he has grown a lot personally, and his leadership has grown as well. By taking to heart the fundamental things he talks about in his book, he said it gave him another depth of leading he didn’t have before.
“There’s no failure in what we do,” he said. “Writing these books has been a conduit to help me be a better leader to my folks.”
Myrick’s books are available for purchase on Amazon.
