Per A. Malm

Per took his first creative writing class as a college freshman in 1985 when the professor told him those unforgettable words, "This reads like a comic book." Since then, he volunteered on the campus sci-fi magazine and writers symposium, and was inspired to publish his own fanzine.

After his family moved to the Keokuk corner of Iowa, Per fell in love with the town and started writing screenplays and stories that took place there, in the spirit of Tromaville. Soon, he connected with other filmmakers in the area and helped with the Keokuk Independent Film Festival. Festival founder Hank Hustus, lamenting the poor turn out of the first year, said, "I could have had a really nice party with all my friends for the money I spent on that!" That comment inspired Per to organize Keokon, the tri-state science fiction convention. Keokon ran for 7 years.

15 years later, he finally earned his BS degree in video production and started writing screenplays and making indie movies, a couple of which actually won awards, sort of.

About 2018, Per started thinking about retirement income and started making coloring books. Those sold dismally. Also about that time the universe opened up Pers brain while he was taking lunch at work and poured a story idea into it. By the end of writing it down in his notebook, he was in tears and knew he had to bring it into reality. After several attempts, he finally finished writing The Golden Vow in winter 2025. Per knew that if he could finish writing one story, he could write more and his decision to finally follow his youthful dream of becoming a writer was made.

Not long after, some YouTuber introduced Per to Public Domain Super Heroes. At first, Per started adapting these for his Keokuk universe screenplays and thought it was a shame that all the wizards didn't really fit. "Fantasy needs an epic trilogy and I'm only comfortable writing shorts."

Then Per discovered that the main inspiration of the author he had read to learn the style for The Golden Vow, Gene Wolfe, was a book called The Dying Earth by Jack Vance and Per's entire perspective on fantasy novels changed.

The Dying Earth is a novel comprised of several interconnected short stories and novellas. It was not one continuous narrative. Each story was independent and could be enjoyed separately, though reading them together certainly compounded the enjoyment. Per quite earnestly thought, "I can do that!" And thus Per's Public Domain Super Hero Fantasy World was born.