Brian Atkins is a Michigan-based author, veteran, blacksmith, and father of seven whose life has been shaped by service, loss, reinvention, and the enduring search for meaning.

Born in North Fort Myers, Florida, Brian served in the United States Air Force during Operation Desert Shield and Desert Storm before building a career in technology and project management. Over the years, his work has taken many forms—from information technology and real estate to blacksmithing and knifemaking—but storytelling has remained a constant thread throughout his life.

In 2012, after the loss of his father, Brian found himself confronting many of the same questions that appear in his writing: how people endure grief, how they adapt to change, and how they continue moving forward when certainty disappears. Those experiences profoundly influenced his perspective and eventually found their way into his fiction.

Today, Brian lives in Michigan, where he teaches blacksmithing and continues to write.

By the Measure of the Sky is his debut novel.