Buried in the family lore is the story about D.N. Sample's paternal great grandfather many times removed who was captured by a native raiding party during the French and Indian War. Though D.N. was never able to confirm it while his maternal grandfather lived, but the story is that he, for the love of a woman, passed on the opportunity to travel with a Wild West show as a trick shot artist.Born near Buffalo-Buffalo, New York rather than Buffalo, Wyoming or actual buffalo herds-D.N. yearned for western adventure, so he dragged his wife and son west as far as Missouri, where he has resided since 1993. D.N.'s lifelong obsession with the western genre began at a young age watching Gunsmoke every Saturday night with his father. Later, his grandfather's collection of Zane Gray novels-a collection he inherited-sucked him in. During college, D.N. discovered Louis L'Amour, whose novels were far more exciting than Systematic Theology. Forty years later, he's turned to writing stories about the old west and hopes to do justice to his heroes, both in real life, and on the pages of his favorite paperbacks.