Duane Gundrum
Destiny
For centuries, the Eden System has existed peacefully alongside the war-mongering Empire of Earth because the Empire was too far away from Eden to make a difference. After an Empire spy steals Eden's lightspeed technology, the Empire launches an invasion against Eden's weak fleet, decimating all of their forces except for the resilient Thurston Seven, captained by Rem Nilan. Facing imminent defeat, the Eden Council entrusts a grave mission to Laura Bontein from the Zeus Colonies, a system destroyed by the Empire years before. Her mission is a simple task: Go to Earth and kill the emperor. Pretty simple.
Laura has abilities and technology of which neither Eden nor the Empire is familiar. None of this does her any good once she discovers the emperor is protected by a strange shield that originates from a planet called Reagul, a planet in its middle age period with kings and wizards fighting for global domination. As she seeks the origin of the shield, she discovers herself to be the subject of the numerous prophecies of this mysterious planet. Here, Laura discovers clues to her own destiny, soon discovering that the wizard in charge of the emperor's shield might possibly be a refugee from the Zeus Colony itself, and quite likely, the reason why Zeus was destroyed in the first place.
With the help of a wandering group of young warriors and the Council of Wizards, the two survivors fight for their lives, begin a war and provide Laura with the chance to avenge the death of her own world.
Innocent Until Proven Guilty
A man murdered...a man framed for the murder with only a short time to prove his innocence before the killer strikes again and strikes at him. A murder mystery set at the highest levels of corporate America where lives are played as a game, where the results are success...or death.
This was the first novel written and published by Duane Gundrum. It is a mystery/suspense novel with numerous twists and turns. Over the years, Duane would continue to return to the suspense genre, never quite able to leave it behind.
Thompson's Bounty
Lieutenant Stephen Thompson of the Coast Guard cutter Melbourne chases a strange ship into a strange rift in time that brings him and his crew to the 16th century, into the middle of a personal war between an English admiral and a pirate named Captain Stone who was once the admiral’s first officer. Once involved in the middle of a hostile exchange between the two sides, Thompson begins to realize that it is difficult to ascertain the difference between good and bad, between who is right and who is wrong, and more importantly, who to trust and who not to trust. Realizing he must rely on the elusive pirate captain who may hold the key to sending Thompson’s crew back to their own time, Thompson begins to learn the code of what it takes to be a pirate and that morality is not always as easy to understand.
This was Duane's first science fiction/fantasy novel published. Like most of his work, it doesn't tightly fit into the genre as it crosses over into historical, science fiction, fantasy and suspense.
The paperback version of the book is more difficult to find these days, although not impossible.
License to Quill by Davina Marconis
In 2006, novelist Duane Gundrum started a project of writing poetry under the name of Davina Marconis, a fictional young homeless girl who was living on the streets of San Francisco and barely surviving. Imagining Davina's manuscript having been found in a dumpster, discarded by a discouraged, yet precocious teenager, an entire book of poetry was developed as a "lost" tome of knowledge that America missed out on by abandoning the poor young woman to the streets.
The book contains numerous works of poetry, including several epic poems, such as License to Quill and Fast Lane.