DAVID POYER was born in DuBois, Pennsylvania in 1949. He grew up in Brockway, Emlenton, and Bradford, and graduated from Bradford Area High School in 1967. He graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy at Annapolis in 1971, and later received a master’s degree from George Washington University.
His active and reserve naval service included sea duty in the Atlantic, Mediterranean, Arctic, Caribbean, and Pacific, and shore duty at the Pentagon, Fleet Training Center, Surface Warfare Development Group, Joint Forces Command, and in Saudi Arabia and Bahrain. He retired from the Joint Forces Command as a captain, with the Defense Superior Service Medal as his highest award.
Poyer began writing in 1976, and is the author of nearly fifty books, including THE MED, THE GULF, THE CIRCLE, THE PASSAGE, TOMAHAWK, CHINA SEA, BLACK STORM, THE COMMAND, THE THREAT, KOREA STRAIT, THE WEAPON, THE CRISIS, THE TOWERS, THE CRUISER, TIPPING POINT, ONSLAUGHT, HUNTER KILLER, DEEP WAR, OVERTHROW, and VIOLENT PEACE, best-selling thrillers; THE DEAD OF WINTER, WINTER IN THE HEART, AS THE WOLF LOVES WINTER, and THUNDER ON THE MOUNTAIN, set in the Pennsylvania hills; and HATTERAS BLUE, BAHAMAS BLUE, LOUISIANA BLUE, and DOWN TO A SUNLESS SEA, underwater adventure. Other noteworthy books are THE ONLY THING TO FEAR, a historical, THE RETURN OF PHILO T. McGIFFIN, a comic novel of Annapolis, and the three volumes of The Civil War at Sea, FIRE ON THE WATERS, A COUNTRY OF OUR OWN, and THAT ANVIL OF OUR SOULS. He’s also done two well-reviewed sailing novels, GHOSTING and THE WHITENESS OF THE WHALE, and several nonfiction books, as well as oral history (HAPPIER THAN THIS DAY AND TIME) and nonfiction. ARCTIC SEA, the latest Dan Lenson novel, appeared in December 2021 from St. Martin’s/Macmillan. 2021 will see a new revised and expanded edition of HEROES OF ANNAPOLIS, nonfiction about men and women of the U.S. Naval Academy from the Mexican War to the War on Terror.
Poyer’s work has been translated into Japanese, Dutch, Italian, Serbo-Croatian, and Hungarian, recorded for audiobooks, published as ebooks, selected by the Literary Guild and Doubleday Book Club, etc. Rights to several properties have been sold or optioned for films.
Poyer has taught or lectured at Annapolis, Flagler College, University of Pittsburgh, Old Dominion University, the Armed Forces Staff College, the University of North Florida, Christopher Newport University, Jimmy Carter Presidential Library, and other institutions. He has been a guest on PBS’s “Writer to Writer” series and on Voice of America, and has appeared at the Southern Festival of Books and many other literary events. He taught for sixteen years in the Maslow MA/MFA in Creative Writing faculty at Wilkes University. He’s currently a fellow at the Virginia Center of Creative Arts and teaches at the Ossabaw Island Writers’ Retreat. He lives on Virginia’s Eastern Shore with novelist Lenore Hart.
DAVID POYER 