I was born and raised high in the Rocky Mountains, where nature is beautiful and the air is thin–both of which helped my imagination to run wild. When I wasn’t outside catching toads with my four brothers, I could eventually be found snuggled up in some corner with my nose in a book. Among my childhood favorites were The Hardy Boys, Redwall, and the Harry Potter series. I had a very supportive first-grade teacher who encouraged all my imaginative stories and inspired my love for writing at a young age.
Around age 12, I began to really struggle socially and turned to fantasy as an escape from teenage drama and bullying. Stories of heroes who rose up out of terrible situations inspired me to imagine myself as a hero as well, fighting through hardship. It was from those imaginings that the earliest ideas for The Risings were born.
As I got older, my dreams of being a writer faded with the all-too-common suggestions to “focus on a real career, one that’s stable and will make money.” Two semesters of hating chemistry and a bad experience in a phlebotomy course were enough to convince me that the medical field was not for me. I then tried several other majors, including civil engineering and architecture, before finally returning to my dreams of being a writer.
I am currently loving life as a mother, a teacher, and a writer. I am actively developing A Land of Our Own Naming, a historical fiction based on the experiences of one of my ancestors. I have pitched it to two publishers already, and have gotten the green light to send in the manuscript… after I add another 50,000 words to it. I am well on my way to having the manuscript expanded, polished, and ready to submit by Fall of 2026, and will be holding on tightly to my dream of seeing it on bookstore shelves very soon.