Sioux Falls author to publish first book for young adults

Never underestimate the impact books can have on a child, Paul Wurth said.

In his case, it was the oldest of his three sisters who influenced him by her passion for reading. He would watch her, taking note of the titles she read. She was a fan of the Lord of the Rings trilogy, and he watched the tale unfold on a big screen, then turned to the written word when he was old enough.

When he was in the middle grades, Wurth fell in love with reading. It started with the series about Percy Jackson, a demigod who battles monsters and gods, then he graduated to Robert Jordan, who wrote tales of epic fantasy with more adult themes.

He has kept up with young adult literature — and with young adults themselves. As a licensed professional counselor with Stronghold Counseling, Wurth estimates that half of his clients are teenagers.

So when he began writing his first novel, focusing on teenagers and young adults as his audience was a natural choice.

His debut YA fantasy novel focuses on adventure, legacy and young people finding their place in the world within a fantasy setting.

“It’s not just grand fantasy,” Wurth said. “I touch on the real world, trauma, grief, things people experience that they don’t talk about.”

River City Siren Press of Richmond, Virginia, will release “The Last Conduit” on July 1. E-book pre-sales begin this week. The book will be the first of a series of novels featuring Teramh Kaelund. As the publisher describes it, the book follows “a young blacksmith whose ordinary life is torn apart when an ancient evil returns, sending him on a dangerous journey into a world of forgotten powers, old bloodlines and a destiny he never asked for.”

When Wurth submitted a query to River City Siren Press, the response was enthusiastic. “Your pitch got me,” his editor wrote. “I love the concept.”

Said publisher Amber Rodenbo, “I was drawn in by the classic epic fantasy feel and character-driven storyline.”

The signing of a contract meant the realization of a long-held dream for Wurth. He grew up on a farm near Remsen in northwest Iowa and joined the Iowa Air National Guard after high school. Wurth served from 2013 to 2022. During that time, he attended the University of South Dakota, earning a degree in kinesiology and energy science. Within a year, he began pursuing a degree in clinical counseling from Capella University and joined Stronghold as a therapist.

During the COVID-19 pandemic of 2020, he began to focus on a longtime interest.

“I always thought writing stories would be fun,” Wurth said. “Not as a full-time job, I’m not trying to make it a career, but it’s something fun that I like to do, and I do it well. I’ve practiced over the years.”

About 18 months ago, he began pitching his idea for “The Last Conduit” to publisher’s agents. With the acceptance by the Virginia publisher, he collaborated with it on final edits and is launching digital presale copies this month.

Even though the LOTR movie he watched in first grade gave him nightmares, Wurth said J.R.R. Tolkien remained an influence.

“As I grew older and studied psychology, I understood that his writing was a way he used as therapy for the trauma he experienced in the war,” Wurth said. “It’s the grand journey-ness of it. The world is bigger than any one person. As someone who works with kids, it’s good to point out the world is bigger than we think it is. Even if we try to make ourselves bigger than we are, we still have our own individuality.”

Wurth started writing in 2018 when he finished his first degree and was interning at the Sanford Fieldhouse, which houses a sports medicine clinic along with indoor athletic fields. He didn’t take creative writing in college, but since then he has watched videos with authors such as Christopher Paolini, who wrote The Inheritance Cycle series. Those videos improved his work, said Wurth, who notes that many of his earlier stories “will never see the light of day.”

Wurth and his wife, Katelyn, live in Sioux Falls. The household includes Cameron, 14, Zoe, 6, and 10-month-old Leo and the family dog, Milo. Only Cameron is old enough to read her father’s book since Wurth recommends that readers no younger than 13 should pick up “The Last Conduit.” It is fantasy, he said, but it does touch on real-world themes such as loss, acceptance, grief and anxiety. The book includes vampires and traumatic events that would lead it to be termed a dark fantasy.

“Young adult is where I feel I’ve been led. It’s because we all start off as kids. There’s a simplicity to it, back when things were a little simpler in life,” Wurth said. “I can see myself (writing for) the middle grades. A series could evolve into the adult world, but as of now I’m going to stay in the middle-grade area.”

“The Last Conduit” will be carried online and in local bookstores. Wurth expects to set up a book-signing tour this fall, initially starting with the smaller towns in northwest Iowa that have the bookstores and libraries he patronized as a boy.

Wurth tries and rejects several words when he tries to describe how it feels to have this dream come true.

“I don’t want to say content because content means I’m not going to do more,” he said. “I could say ecstatic. Let me look at my thesaurus. … Honestly, I just feel excited. I can’t really think of a word that better fits than excited. Hearing somebody say yes (to publication) — if you’ve ever been in the trenches before, it’s not a fun place to sit. Serene. Is that a good word? Serene because I’m content, peaceful and excited.”