Syvertson was born Reidar Otto Syvertsen on April 19, 1941, son of Otto and Lillian Syvertsen. A lifelong New Yorker, he graduated from Taft High School and went on to receive his BA in 1969 and MA in 1971 from SUNY Binghamton. In 1979 he was awarded his Teaching Certification from Hunter College. He then taught science at the Martin Luther King Jr. High School in Manhattan and essay writing as an adjunct professor at St. John's University, Pace University, and CUNY College of Staten Island. He was also a creative writing instructor in the Mystery Writers of America “Mentor Program.” His Buddhist faith and study of meditation with Tibetan monks led to a lasting interest in Tibet as a setting for his fiction as well as sympathy with the Tibetan resistance to Chinese rule. Syvertsen authored or co-authored a total of 34 science fiction, action-adventure, and fantasy books. He is best known for Doomsday Warrior, a series of 19 novellas set in and after 2089, depicting the struggle to free America from Soviet domination following defeat in a nuclear conflagration, under the command of rebel leader Ted Rockson. The first four books in the Doomsday Warrior series were written in collaboration with Jan Stacy; the remainder were written by Syvertsen alone. The series was published as part of the Zebra Books’ Men’s Adventure series, under the pseudonym of Ryder Stacy. GraphicAudio versions of all 19 books were produced. A second series, the Computerized Attack/Defense System novels, features Colonel Dean Sturgis as commander of a new generation of high-tech soldiers. The first of the C.A.D.S. novels was written in collaboration with Jan Stacy, #2-8 solely by Syvertsen. A third series, Syvertsen’s personal favorite, is the six-part Mystic Rebel series, set in Tibet and featuring CIA operative Bart Lasker. Syvertsen’s only stand-alone work of fiction, Psychic Spawn, co-authored with Rosemary Ellen Guiley writing under the name of Adrian Fletcher, was singled out by Visionary Living as enjoying “a rebirth of deserved attention." It follows the adventures of Rainer Stern, tortured by the Nazis as a child, as he confronts a band of psychic super-children bred by his old Nazi nemesis thirty years later. In addition to his works of fiction, Syvertsen co-authored three reference books on the film industry. Two – the Great Book of Movie Monsters and the Great Book of Movie Villains – are encyclopedia-like compilations; the third, Rockin’ Reels, is a genre book listing and exploring the history of rock-n-roll themed movies. In 1989, Syvertsen married Paige Lewis. The couple had one son, born in 1993. Syvertsen died on Feb. 24, 2015.
Books
Fiction
Doomsday Warrior (series), published under the pseudonym Ryder Stacy
Doomsday Warrior #1. New York: Zebra Books, 1984,.
Doomsday Warrior #2 Red America. New York: Zebra Books, 1984,.
Doomsday Warrior #3 The Last American. New York: Zebra Books, 1984,.
Doomsday Warrior #4 Bloody America. New York: Zebra Books, 1985,.
Doomsday Warrior #5 America's Last Declaration. New York: Zebra Books, 1985,.
