My introduction to the Ring of Fire series could be used as a case study for Eric Flint's support for the Baen Free Library. For several months I walked past a lone copy of 1632 sitting in the Science-Fiction/Fantasy section of my local Borders. I was always intrigued by the cover art but never wanted to take the risk of purchasing a book by an author I had not heard of before.

During the summer of 2003 I was working at a marketing research company completing a internship for college and I did not have enough work to keep myself busy during the day. I had picked up a copy of one of the Belisarius novels at the library and after I finished reading the book I saw some information in the back of the book regarding Baen.com. While looking for something to kill some time at work I checked out the website and found the Baen Free Library section of the website and saw that 1632 was one of the books that was available. I started reading the book that afternoon and was hooked immediately, I finished the book the following day and picked up both a copy of 1632 and 1633 that weekend. Since then I have anxiously awaited the every new release in the Ring of Fire universe.

Eric Hansen