Look and Listen
Biography
I put off writing for as long as I could. After a number miscellaneous career moves in politics, web design and technical writing, I ran out of excuses and diversions, and faced my fear of rejection. In 2004, I made my first intentional move toward a writing career and entered the 3-Day Novel Contest. It blew my mind. The contest is insane. And the thrill of finishing a novel in 72 hours is addicting. Much to my surprise, I won third place. Good start, I thought. Then I wrote a number of short stories and sent them into the big world. Rejection. I picked myself back up, dusted myself off and enrolled in a writing course. There, I got my bearings, learned the basics and began to understand how my writing brain works. I also attended some conferences, participated in workshops and soaked up as much exposure to successful writers as I could. In 2006, I spent a week working with Melissa Pritchard at a workshop. This was the week where I moved writing from hobby status to career status in my mind. Melissa inspired and encouraged me. I wrote more stories and sent them out into the big, scary world. Result. Two stories were selected by The Liars League and were read live in a pub in London (woohoo!). Another story was published in Plain Spoke. A fourth story was selected by NANO Fiction, but slipped between the cracks of fiction editor change-over. (*sigh*) On a whim, I wrote a children's story and submitted it the Half Price Books Bedtime Storybook contest. "Harvey and the Horrible Sneeze" was selected for inclusion in the 13th edition. Over the years, I began a couple of novels, but none of them panned out. Then one day, while I was cleaning my bathtub (no lie), a sentence popped into my head. "When Janie wished her stepsister would disappear, she should have been more specific." I thought this was the beginning of my next short story. But when I began writing, the story grew and grew into my first YA novel. I completed the manuscript in the spring of 2008 and am currently seeking an agent. I continue to take classes. My current guru is James Sallis, writer and teacher extraordinaire. I also attend conferences and workshops as often as I can. I've workshopped with Elizabeth Searle, T.M. McNally, Melissa Pritchard, and Jewell Parker Rhodes. I have a M.A. in English Literature and studied medieval paleography, including a stint at St. Johns College, Cambridge. I'm married and the mother of two young children. This makes finding time to write difficult on even the best days. I'm learning to rise early and stay up late. Sleep is for wimps!
Inspiration
I have a list of things to do before I die. I wrote the list when I was a sophomore in high school. I took the list seriously after a brush with death in Edinburgh, Scotland on New Year's Eve, 1996/97. This list, above all else, motivates me. Right now, the first thing on my list is to successfully publish and gain a readership for my YA novel series. As far as everyday inspirations go, I'm inspired by beauty. Reading beautifully written stories by other writers inspires me. Beautiful music inspires me. Beauty in nature inspires me. My children inspire me. Some writers who inspire me are Markus Zusak, Bret Anthony Johnston, Ron Carlson, James Sallis, Louise Erdrich, Melissa Pritchard, Kim Addonizio, Vladimir Nabokov, Neil Gaiman, and about a gazillion and one more that I'm failing to mention. My dream is to write novels that will inspire middle grade and young adult readers. If a 12 year-old picked up my novel, read it and thought, "cool" and then handed it off to another friend...well, that would be a dream come true for me.