Author: Ray Melnik
Title: Emergent Novels
Bio: Just before college, Ray won first place in the "National Pen Women Competition" for his fictional short story, Distinction, as well as winning second place in the New York "Best of City - The Written Word". While attending his local community college in Staten Island, New York, he majored in literature and studied existential writers such as Jean Paul Sartre and Albert Camus. 

When he left college, he pursued a music career, as a singer and lyricist writing lyrics to dozens of original compositions. As a musician and then audio engineer, Ray wrote a monthly column on professional audio for “American Liverpool”, a local music magazine in Staten Island, New York. 

Later moving into the field of technology as a network engineer, he wrote as a member of the technology panel for the Times Herald Record, a regional newspaper in the lower Hudson Valley, New York. For eight years he was the primary writer of home technology features for the website “New Technology Home”. 

Ray has always been an advocate for science and reason. He enjoys reading quantum physics, astrophysics, evolution and earth sciences. The influences of existentialism and science are evident in his first two novels. “The Room” a novel, was published in April 2007, "To your Own Self Be True” a novel was published in March 2009, "Burnished Bridge", a novella was published in March 2010, and "Eyes In This World", a series ending novel was published in Sept 2013.