About the author

Helder Oliveira

<p><strong>My name is Helder Oliveira (Helder de Jesus Ferreira de Oliveira) and I am an Angolan citizen. I write poetry, detective short stories and other short stories in Portuguese and English. I wrote my first poem (an acrostic poem in Portuguese)&nbsp;when I was 17 and a student. I have written several poems and detective and other short stories in Portuguese and English. In fact, one of my passions in life is to write and read poetry and detective and other stories.&nbsp;</strong></p> <p><strong>I&rsquo;ve been working mostly as a teacher and translator in Angola. My hobbies are the Internet, reading, writing, listening to SW&nbsp;radio and walking. I have no proper time of day or night to write; I write when inspiration comes. One of my favourite quotes is, &ldquo;Live your day as if it were the last of your life&rdquo;. The two qualities that I like most in a human being are honesty and simplicity. The two that I most detest are racism and dishonesty. My favourite day of the week is Saturday and I have two favourite months, which are June and December. I have two favourite writers: the British writer &quot;Agatha Christie&quot; and the American writer &ldquo;Irving Wallace&rdquo;. My favourite poet is the Portuguese poet, &ldquo;Bocage&rdquo;.&nbsp;</strong></p> <p><strong>When I read such beautiful poems like, for example, the poems &ldquo;IF&rdquo; by Rudyard Kipling; &ldquo;Maternity&rdquo;, by Alice Meynell; &ldquo;The Raven&rdquo;, by Edgar Allan Poe; &ldquo;My Heart is Heavy&rdquo;, by Sarah Teasdale, or &quot;O suspiro&quot; and &quot;Em Cinzas se Desfez Teu Corpo Brando&quot; by Bocage...&nbsp;When I read these poems, or when I read any poem that is beautiful, a poem that touches my senses, I feel beauty engulfing my soul and at those moments I see life farther beyond the insignificant pettiness of this world, and I feel then that life is worth living. There&rsquo;s no doubt that poetry is one of the most beautiful things in this world.</strong></p> <p><strong>Again, when I read such best-sellers as &ldquo;The Pigeon Project&rdquo; by Irving Wallace, &ldquo;The Murder of Roger Ackroyd&rdquo; by Agatha Christie, or &ldquo;The Boy Slave&rdquo; by Kola Onadipe, for example, I feel that some people came to this world just to make such beautiful things to please others&hellip; I think that reading a beautiful poem or an interesting book is one of the greatest pleasures in this world!</strong></p>