By Stowell P. Watters
Staff Writer
    Steven Kayser recently published a full-length novel out of his Kennebunk home while teaching history in Wells, raising two trilingual girls and still finding time to bike, swim and jog on a regular basis.
    “Writing this book took a lot of work, thousands of hours, it was a huge learning process for me,” said Kayser, who wrote “The Spaniard’s Dagger” under the penname Steven Farquhar.
    Kayser described the book as two stories unfolding in unison, charged with myth, history and suspense as the main character’s search for the roots of a mysterious bejeweled dagger lead him through not only the past adventures of sea-faring pirates but also the throes of love and betrayal and the quest for truth in his own life. Inspiration came to Kayser in California, where he did his graduate study with the geological sciences department of The University of California at Santa Barbara (UCS on a project examining watersheds and their hydro-geologic response to wildfires.
    “I started the book 10 years ago, and drew a lot from my work out there,” he said. “I have always had an appreciation for earth science, geology and history in general.”
    The book, which went through 10 major revisions, weaves Sir Francis Drake and his three-year journey around the world with the plight of the Chumash and Miwok Indians. Kayser, after working as a teacher’s assistant for writing and environmental science classes in California, went on to receive his advanced degree in history at UCSB, which he now employs as a teacher at Wells High School.
    Long before his days as an author, Kayser was a teenager living in Düsseldorf , Germany, the place of his birth. He contrasted his experience as a youth in Germany with those of his two daughters.
    “Whether it be because of the time or the place, things were a lot more family-oriented in my youth,” he said. “I try to keep that going in my own family, we eat together, and I try to keep the kids away from television as much as possible.”
    At the age of 17 Kayser moved to his mother’s home in Massachusetts, near Salem. After high school he joined the 82nd Airborne infantry where he was stationed in North Carolina, and then Italy.
    The job of any member in the 82nd Airborne infantry is to throw themselves out of a speeding plane, high above enemy lines and navigate their way to the earth via the straps of an enormous parachute. Kayser estimates that he did about 29 of these jumps.
    “I came in pretty much right between the Grenada and Panama conflicts, so I was fortunate enough to never have to shoot at someone,” Kayser said. “After duty we would take the train into Venice, it was beautiful, amazing.”
    There among the gondolas and the sluicing waterways of Venice, Kayser met his current wife Manuela, who speaks Italian. Presently the Kayser household operates on a varied lexicon; English, Italian and German.
    Growing up, Kayser always had what he calls a “tiny voice” in the back of his head that told him he would find satisfaction in writing. Teaching, he decided, was the best avenue because it would afford him the time to write while still providing a livable wage for his growing family.
    “I thought ‘hey, wouldn’t it be great to make a living like (Michael) Crichton, (John) Grisham or even Dan Brown?’’ he said. “But the reality is you have to start somewhere, and in that time you need to be working, so teaching was a natural choice for me, and I really do enjoy it.”
    The biggest hurdle for Kayser in publishing “The Spaniard’s Dagger” wasn’t actually the writing, but the marketing and jacket design process. After going to a small publishing company and trying to work with them on a graphic and layout for the book’s jacket, Kayser became frustrated.
    “I had this idea in my head and I sat down with a small publisher to try and work out the jacket, but nothing got worked out, I couldn’t get them to produce what was in my head,” he said.
    So he read up on the publishing process and took matters into his own hands, creating the Aragon Publishing company out of his home in Kennebunk. With Manuela he was able to finally produce the jacket he wanted which depicts a shining dagger descending into an obscure vortex. The vortex, Kayser said, represents the unique way the book deals with different timelines.
    “I wanted a cover that would grab people and make them want to read my book,” he said. “Being an author is different than being a writer, there is a huge amount of time that must be devoted to marketing and organization.”
    As part of this Kayser did a dozen book signings at local book shops, including WiggleWeigle’s Books in downtown Biddeford. The September book signing was a great event for a great book, according to store owner Anastasia Weigle.
    “We had a pretty great response, we first started selling it at our Old Orchard Beach store, then my husband read it and enjoyed it so we brought it to our Biddeford store and we continue to sell copies,” Weigle said. “The Portland public library also grabbed some copies for their collection.”
    As a large part of the story takes place in the sea the reader would think that Kayser had spent a great deal of time working with boats, but this isn’t exactly the case.
    “I spent some time on a scallop boat, but I became extremely seasick,” he said, laughing. “I have always lived near the coast and I always loved books like Moby Dick, where a lot of action takes place on the water.”
    Kayser has already adapted his book into a screenplay, and plans on using this as a way to bring his work to a larger audience. As for the future, Kayser is excited, vigilant and hopeful.
    “This has been such an enormous learning experience for me, and I plan on writing a second book as soon as I can find the time,” he said, adding, “this time around I will know exactly what I am doing, and more importantly, why I am doing it.”