Why Keep It Simple When You Can Do It in Threes? An Introduction.

A post about heart, mind, rage, and structure.

It’s time to unlock the doors. Not just to the finished stories, but to the construction site behind them. I’ve realized something: The finished book is the goal, sure, but the path to get there is the actual adventure. That includes the painful art of “killing your darlings.” Characters pop up out of nowhere but never make it into the final draft. Not because they’re boring, but because they steer the story in the wrong direction. Deleting entire chapters feels a lot like code refactoring: It stings for a moment, but the system runs much smoother afterwards.

The question I get asked a lot (and ask myself, honestly): Why write three books at the same time? The answer is simple: My brain isn’t wired for linear thinking. I need a different outlet for every mood.

• For the Heart: “The Price of Applause” (Der Preis des Applauses) When I need freedom and want to shake off the weight of the daily grind, I dive into the world of Leo and Max. It’s a crossover YA novel that blurs the lines between young adult and adult fiction. At its core, it’s a modern coming-of-age story: It’s about character formation through discipline, the ache of ambition, and finding your own identity—whether in school or on stage. Here, emotions are allowed to run high; here, it’s all about “us against the world.”

• For the Mind and the Rage: “Puritanis” When I watch the news and see political decisions drifting further away from reality, I write Puritanis. Here, Severin and Bernd aren’t fighting simple villains, but the seductive logic of a bankrupt state. It’s a world where the “Liquidator” Völkner doesn’t act out of cruelty, but out of mathematical necessity: To save the system, the “unprofitable” parts must be severed. The terrifying part isn’t the malice, but that the math actually checks out on paper. It is a battle against a bureaucracy that started with “good intentions” but eventually cut humanity as a cost factor.

• For the Structure: “DevOps for Anton” (DevOps für Anton) And then there are the days on the job. When I have to explain for the hundredth time why we need guardrails, and the only answer I get is an annoyed “Why?”. That’s when it’s time for DevOps for Anton. My technical guide for anyone who wants to understand why structure actually equals freedom.

Three projects. Three worlds. One author. Welcome to my mind.