Rome built its empire on obedience, discipline and the belief that a man’s word, once given under oath, was the only god he needed. Different Roads, Same Direction follows three centurions who lived by that code, each convinced his road was his own, until each discovered it had been leading somewhere far bigger than the empire he served. This is historical fiction rooted in scripture, telling the stories history never thought to name.
Born and raised in rural Oregon, Darrell Smith developed a lifelong connection to hard work, family, faith, adventure, and the outdoors. After serving in the United States Marine Corps as a Sergeant and expert rifleman, he earned a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration with a minor in Economics. Darrell went on to build a remarkable 45-year career in the retail and wholesale lumber industry, working across the Pacific and contributing to projects throughout Hawaii, Alaska, and the Northwest. His life has also included commercial diving, logging, rodeo, hunting, fishing, horseback riding, and exploring remote wilderness areas. A devoted father, grandfather, and great-grandfather, Darrell values the lessons each experience has taught him and considers himself blessed by the life he has lived.
Furtis has spent forty years soldiering across the empire, still searching for something he can’t name. Dux, his younger brother, has built his life on proof and logic, distrustful of anything he can’t measure. Julius has survived shipwreck, slavery and the sea, and is still deciding what kind of man that survival has made him. Each believes he’s walking his own road. Different Roads, Same Direction is the story of where those roads actually lead, and why they all arrive at the same place.
A career soldier’s forty-year search across the empire ends in a dusty road outside Capernaum, in front of a man who tells him he has more faith than anyone in Israel.
Raised on proof, geometry, and the discipline of a legendary grandfather who began as a centurion of the Tenth Cohort and rose to become the commanding centurion of the First Cohort, Dux must decide whether his brother’s discovery can be trusted without being proven first.
Pulled from the sea after a shipwreck that killed half his crew, Julius has to work out what kind of man he wants to be with the life he’s been handed back.
The soldiers who stood at the foot of the cross itself were never given names by history. This is where their stories are finally told.
Different Roads, Same Direction brings together three remarkably different lives and gives each one a question worth asking: what are we really searching for? The characters feel human, their struggles feel genuine, and the story leaves you thinking long after the final page.
What makes this book compelling is the way it explores belief, logic, hardship, and survival without making the answers easy. Furtis, Dux, and Julius take very different paths, yet their journeys gradually reveal a deeper connection. A fascinating and memorable read.
The contrast between these characters is what drew me in. One trusts experience, another trusts reason, and another has been shaped by survival. Watching their separate journeys move towards the same destination creates a story filled with depth, humanity, and unexpected meaning.
Three roads, three soldiers, and the story behind them: notes on the faith, doubt and history woven through Different Roads, Same Direction, for anyone who wants to go a little deeper before or after reading it.
Stories have always been one of the ways people make sense of faith. Biblical fiction takes that impulse a step further by combining imaginative storytelling with biblical settings, people, events, or…
An old tracker circles his prey through moonlit ferns, fifty winters into a life of hunting, and he still has not found the answer he is really looking for. Elsewhere, a…
Some authors build their stories around worlds they have never seen. Others come to writing after a lifetime of varied work. Darrell Smith has a long list of experiences behind him:…