Who is Ben

Ben writes under the name B.A. Grigg.

He has been hooked on fantasy for as long as he can remember, particularly stories built around expansive worlds, flawed characters, and consequences that are allowed to linger rather than reset.

Before taking writing seriously, most of his time with the genre came through audiobooks rather than physical books. Long working days made listening easier than reading, and over the years, that habit quietly added up to well over a year’s worth of listening across epic fantasy and LitRPG. Early influences such as Michael J. Sullivan, Scott Lynch, and Peter V. Brett helped cement his love of epic fantasy, while discovering LitRPG later on, particularly through authors like J.M. Clarke, J.T. Wright, and Kyle Kirrin, ultimately pushed him from listener to writer.

His first two attempts at writing were, by his own admission, an absolute garbage fire, each quietly consigned to the digital incinerator before anyone else could witness the damage. The third attempt became The Alurium Saga, a project he spent nearly two years developing before he was finally willing to let anyone else read it.

For more than twenty years, Ben has worked as a butcher, starting at the bottom scrubbing down cold rooms and working his way up to managing a small shop, an experience that turns out to translate disturbingly well into writing about monsters. After being asked one too many times whether his book was “about meat,” he eventually decided to lean into the idea. That decision became his second ongoing project, Dungeon Beasts and How to Butcher Them.

These days, most of his time outside work is split between family life with a very young child who has a remarkable talent for preventing sleep, getting outdoors when life allows, and stealing whatever hours he can to keep writing.

Time may be scarce, but the obsession with fantasy is not going anywhere. He has no intention of stopping any time soon.