Look and Listen

Biography

I started writing science fiction and fantasy not long after I had finished reading all of the books in my father’s reading collection. Stories about girl agents defeating alien bad guys and tales of wizards’ apprentices looking for forgotten treasure filled school notebooks alongside my regular homework. I write young adult fantasy and science fiction. My first book, The Crystal Throne, won the 2002 EPPIE for best Fantasy, and my second, Agents & Adepts, won the 2003 Dream Realm Award for Best Anthology. The sequel, Talking To Trees, was released January 2006, also by Amber Quill Press. My short stories have appeared in magazines and anthologies. The Monster and the Archaeologists appeared in Big Finish's Professor Bernice Summerfield and the Dead Men Diaries, The Oracle of Cilens is in Beyond the Mundane: Flights of Mind from Mundania Press, and The Diplomat's Tale appeared in Short Trips: Repercussions, published by Big Finish. I also has a children's picture book, Michael & the Elf, published by Writers Exchange E-Publishing. I live in Winona, MN, where the river bluffs along the Mississippi River double as cliffsides on alien planets or the deep mysterious forests in a magical world. I'm well used to dealing with alien lifeforms, since I'm owned by two birds (a cockatoo and a jenday). who graciously allow me to write about other animals, as well as birdlike aliens.

Inspiration

When I first started writing, I was heavily influenced by the works of J.R.R. Tolkien, Andre Norton, James White, James Schmitz, Eric Frank Russell, Susan Cooper, and Diana Wynne Jones. I love to read young adult fantasy and science fiction still and I enjoy the writings of J.K. Rowling, Diane Duane, Tamora Pierce, Lois McMaster Bujold, C.J. Cherryh, Janet Kagan, and many others.