THE GAME
Winner of the 2026 IndieReader Discovery Awards in Popular Fiction
What’s the book’s first line?
“Tyler steps into the empty elevator and leans against the cool marble wall.”
What’s the book about? Give us the “pitch”.
Financial analyst Tyler Rush is working toward one goal. Saving his younger sister, Anna, from the relatives slowly breaking her. Then a broken elevator strands him on a floor that should not exist, where CEOs, senators, and power brokers are playing poker for stakes far greater than money.
Tyler has a rare gift for reading people and markets, and it earns him a place inside “the game,” a hidden contest where influence shapes the real world. But staying in it carries a price. To keep any hope of saving Anna, Tyler must infiltrate a rival firm and steal the breakthrough algorithm at the heart of his mentor’s grand design. The problem is the woman who built it. Brilliant, principled, and the first person to ever truly see him.
The Game is a high-stakes novel about ambition, power, and atonement, and the difference between controlling the table and being honest enough to actually win.
What inspired you to write the book? A particular person? An event?
I had always wanted to write. I just never did. I studied engineering, became an actuary, and thanks to AP credits, made it through college without taking a single English class. Writing remained a someday goal for decades.
Then in 2017, my wife suggested I attend a weekend writing seminar at our local community college. The visiting instructor became a mentor and a friend, and I have not looked back since. There is something about building a story, improving it draft after draft, and growing through the process that I find genuinely exciting.
What surprised me most is how much writing has taught me about myself. Writing novels about fictional characters has shown me a great deal about who I am, how I think, and even how I lead. I did not expect that when I walked into that seminar, but it may be the part of the journey I value most.
What’s the main reason someone should really read this book?
Because it works on two levels at once. On the surface, it is a fast, twist-filled story about a hidden world of power, a high-stakes theft of corporate secrets, and a poker game where the bets are not always money. Underneath, it is about something more familiar. A person trying to make peace with the worst thing that ever happened to him and learning he does not have to carry it alone.
You get suspense, strategy, and surprises, but you also get a character to root for. And if you have ever sat at a table, literal or otherwise, wondering whether you had the nerve to push your chips in, this book was written with you in mind.
What’s the most distinctive thing about the main character? Who-real or fictional-would you say the character reminds you of?
The most distinctive thing about Tyler Rush is that he can read everyone but himself. He has an almost uncanny ability to spot patterns in markets, algorithms, and the twitch of a man bluffing across a poker table. Turn that gift inward, though, and it short-circuits into guilt, self-doubt, and a quiet belief that he does not deserve the win.
He is a brilliant analyst who trusts data, strategy, and instinct almost everywhere except in his own life. Watching him learn to trust himself, face his past, and let people in is the real emotional engine of the book.
He shares some DNA with Mitch McDeere from The Firm. He is a talented young man recruited into a powerful, seductive system that is larger and more dangerous than he understands. Unlike Mitch, though, Tyler’s hardest battle is not just outthinking the people pulling the strings. It is deciding whether he can finally stop pulling against himself.
When did you first decide to become an author?
Later than most. For two decades, my world was numbers. I studied engineering, became an actuary, and built a career that had very little to do with creative writing.
I had always wanted to write, but I treated it like something I might get to someday. About nine years ago, that changed. Writing stopped being an abstract ambition and became something I was willing to take seriously. Once I started, I found myself drawn to the challenge of building stories, revising them, and trying to make them better. Hundreds of thousands of keystrokes later, The Game exists.
Is this the first book that you’ve written?
Yes. The Game is my first novel. Its sequel, Beyond Control, is currently in production. Set five years after The Game, it is scheduled for release from Black Rose Writing in December 2026.
What do you do for work when you’re not writing?
When I am not writing, I serve as CEO of an insurance company. Before that, I was an actuary, so much of my professional life has revolved around risk, uncertainty, incentives, and human behavior. In hindsight, that was pretty good preparation for writing novels about power, ambition, and difficult choices.
How much time do you generally spend on your writing?
Whenever I can. Early mornings, late nights, the occasional hotel room on a work trip. I’m a heavy reviser, so for me it’s less about waiting for inspiration and more about showing up and trying to make the story better, one draft at a time.
Is there something in particular that motivates you (fame? fortune?)
A sense of urgency. I have stories I want to tell, ideas I want to explore, and a persistent feeling that time matters. I came to writing later than many authors, which probably adds to that feeling. It is less about fame or fortune and more about making the most of the ideas I still have and the time I have to write them.