Mike Anthony is the pen name of Dr. Dondi M. Day for coastal thrillers, apocalyptic fiction, and first-responder resilience. His family adventures, memoir, and business books are published as Dondi M. Day.
Dondi M. Day co-owns Crystal Coast Beachside with his family.
Featured release
Why Good Employees Stay
A Practical Guide to Building Trust, Keeping Your Best People, and Reducing Turnover
Business · Leadership · By Dr. Dondi M. Day · eBook
eBook release: October 30, 2026 on Amazon
Why do good employees stay—and what makes them leave? Dr. Dondi M. Day offers practical guidance for managers and business leaders who want to build trust, strengthen employee retention, and reduce turnover. Explore honest communication, fair decisions, sustainable workloads, meaningful growth, and the gap between what leaders promise and what employees experience. Includes a leader’s self-assessment, discussion guide, practical tools, and a Promise Check to put the lessons into practice.
Book details
Memoir & nonfiction
The badge, the 2 a.m. call, contracts, and the dream you keep putting off.
Ghosts, Smoke, and the Badge
A Police Memoir
Police Memoir · By Dondi M. Day
A raw, honest police memoir from a former North Carolina law-enforcement officer: the foot pursuits and fender-benders, the calls that haunt every shift, the people you carry home in your head, and the badge you take off at night. A first-person account of modern policing, post-traumatic stress, brotherhood, faith, and the cost of running toward the smoke.
Dondi Day's story offers an incredibly authentic glimpse into the realities of law enforcement. The stories are honest and raw, painting vivid pictures of police work that resonate deeply with anyone who has worn the uniform. — NYPD, Retired
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Stoic in the Storm
Resilience for First Responders: Leading Through Chaos
First-Responder Resilience · By Mike Anthony · eBook
A working philosophy built for the 2 a.m. call: stories from the field, Stoic principles adapted for real crises, and practical tools for first responders. Seventeen chapters pair field scenes with operational principles and exercises, plus a field guide for before, during, and after the calls that stay with you.
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Operational Contract Risk & Claims Management
The Complete Series: Parts One through Five
Business / Contract Risk · By Dondi M. Day
A five-part treatment of the contract lifecycle, from formation through claims and disputes: risk allocation, documentation, notice, escalation, and the evidence needed to support a claim. A companion workbook and study guide offers structured exercises and worked examples.
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Why Good Employees Stay
A Practical Guide to Building Trust, Keeping Your Best People, and Reducing Turnover
Business · Leadership · By Dr. Dondi M. Day · eBook
eBook release: October 30, 2026 on Amazon
Why do good employees stay—and what makes them leave? Dr. Dondi M. Day offers practical guidance for managers and business leaders who want to build trust, strengthen employee retention, and reduce turnover. Explore honest communication, fair decisions, sustainable workloads, meaningful growth, and the gap between what leaders promise and what employees experience. Includes a leader’s self-assessment, discussion guide, practical tools, and a Promise Check to put the lessons into practice.
Book details
The 17-Day Dream Blueprint
A Step-by-Step Plan to Take Action on the Dream You Keep Putting Off
Personal Development · By Dondi M. Day
A 17-day personal development plan for anyone tired of waiting on the right time. Daily prompts, exercises, and small commitments that turn the dream you talk about into one you act on. For first-time founders, mid-career pivoters, and anyone ready to move from idea to action.
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Reader questions
What is Across Bogue Sound about?
Across Bogue Sound is coastal apocalyptic fiction by Mike Anthony, the pen name of Dr. Dondi M. Day, and Book One of The Bogue Banks Chronicles. As illness and uncertainty threaten North Carolina’s coast, mechanic and former Coast Guardsman Evan Mercer faces difficult choices about duty, survival, and protecting his family. Bogue Banks offers refuge, but island life brings its own limits.
Is Bogue Banks a real place?
Yes. Bogue Banks is a barrier island on North Carolina’s Crystal Coast, between the Atlantic Ocean and Bogue Sound. Its communities include Emerald Isle, Indian Beach, Salter Path, Pine Knoll Shores, and Atlantic Beach. Across Bogue Sound uses this real coastal geography as the setting for a fictional apocalyptic story.
Where should I start with Mike Anthony’s books?
For coastal apocalyptic fiction, start with Across Bogue Sound, Book One of The Bogue Banks Chronicles. For coastal crime and corruption, start with Betrayal, Book One: A Cedar Shoals Thriller, followed by Surge, Signed, and Privilege as they become available. If pirate adventures appeal to you, explore the Calico Creek books. Choose the story type that interests you; these are separate series.
How is The Bogue Banks Chronicles different from A Cedar Shoals Thriller?
The Bogue Banks Chronicles begins with Across Bogue Sound and explores family, survival, and the vulnerability of coastal communities during an apocalyptic crisis. The Cedar Shoals thrillers begin with Betrayal and focus on small-town policing, corruption, and dangerous secrets. Cedar Shoals is fictional; the two series tell separate stories rather than continuing one shared plot.
Which Crystal Coast locations inspire the stories?
Bogue Banks, Bogue Sound, Emerald Isle, Atlantic Beach, Morehead City, Beaufort, and Calico Creek help inspire the coastal landscapes and atmosphere. Across Bogue Sound draws on the island, sound, bridges, and mainland connections; the Calico Creek adventures draw on the area’s waterways and pirate lore. Betrayal uses a fictional community shaped by coastal life. Inspiration does not mean every real location appears in every book, and fictional events are not claims about real residents.
Explore coastal apocalyptic fiction · Read about the real Bogue Banks behind the books
About the author
Dr. Dondi M. Day is a U.S. Coast Guard veteran, licensed OUPV captain, and former North Carolina law-enforcement officer. He co-owns Crystal Coast Beachside with his family. The communities, waterways, and barrier islands around him inspire his coastal stories; his professional experience informs his books on leadership, resilience, and contract risk.
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