Stephen Alder was born in 1952 in Greenville Texas. Shortly thereafter his father joined the US army, and he was off to see the world. After living in Texas, Oklahoma and Alabama, his family moved to Germany in 1960, where he resided until 1963. This was a significant time in the history of the world, as the border between East and West Berlin was closed and a concrete wall erected in 1961. In June of 1963 JFK visited West Berlin and made his famous Ich bin ein Berliner speech. Living in Kassel, which was about 30 miles from the border with East Germany, Stephen’s family had some tense moments during the Cuban missile crisis in 1962. Apart from that, it was an enjoyable time as the family traveled all around West Germany and visited the Netherlands, Austria, and Italy.
Next, Stephen moved to Fort Hamilton in Brooklyn, New York in time to be enrolled in a public school there. He was in a classroom at PS 104, which is walking distance from Fort Hamilton, when JFK was assassinated in November 1963. Six months later Stephen moved to Tacoma, Washington, living there until 1966. Then, it was on to Topeka Kansas for a year, followed by a year in Oklahoma City. Returning to New York City in 1968, this time on Staten Island, Stephen lived on the Fort Wadsworth military base (now a national park). Living there until graduating from high school in 1970, Stephen then moved to Washington state to attend college.
After joining his family in Honolulu in 1972, Stephen lived in Hawaii until 1976 when he moved to Los Angeles California. While in Los Angeles, where he currently resides, Stephen embarked on a career in technical writing. In 2002, he married a woman from Indonesia and made a few trips to the islands of Java and Bali. These experiences, along with his interest in ancient history and culture, helped shape the book he would eventually write. Finally, around 2014, he determined to start working on that book. This fictional novel, Deehabta’s Song, was published in 2019.