Bio:
Childhood
I was born February 19, 1984, in Tacoma, WA, making me an official Pisces (which means that I was an idealistic escapist with an overactive imagination from the start).
I was blessed with parents who have always been loving and supportive, and a brother, two years older, who I was always able to consider a close and protective friend.
I started writing when I was three. No—really. I told my mom one day that I had an idea for a book, so she sat down at our archaic PC and typed what I told her to type. The story was called “Rosie and the Rosebush” and it was about a little girl who fell into a rosebush and was transported to a magical rose world and got to play with all the magical rose creatures. When I was done, my mom printed it out and let me illustrate the pages. Of course, I only illustrated two or three of them because at three years old one can only draw so many roses before they lose interest and go play with dolls instead.
I was always an avid book reader. Some of my earliest memories are of my mom reading Huckleberry Finn, Black Beauty, and King Arthur to my brother and me. And—although I don’t remember it myself—I’m told that my favorite thing when I was a baby was a small lamb-shaped book that I would sleep with, chew on, and carry with me everywhere I went. It was my version of a teddy bear. The first “real” books (i.e., no pictures) that I read were The Chronicles of Narnia. And with that, my love of fantasy was born.
Perhaps my second writing epiphany, after Rosie, came one day when I was standing before the library catalogue search computer and I thought, “I want to read a story that has a princess and a prince and a buried treasure and a mermaid.” (That is exactly what I thought—I remember it quite clearly.) So I searched for princess, prince, buried treasure, and mermaid, and, to my endless chagrin, came up with absolutely nothing. I was sorely disappointed that no such story existed, but then I had the realization that I should write it, so that it would exist. Sadly, I never did write it (I still preferred the dolls), but I do believe that was the first time I felt like I had something worth saying that someone else in the world might consider worth reading.
Sailor Moon Fanfiction
Skip to sixth grade, age eleven, when I would spend the hour before school watching cartoons. One day while flipping channels I came across a show where the girls had magic powers, wore short skirts, and were really super cute. The first Sailor Moon episode I saw was the one where the scouts “defeat” Jadeite, and Beryl turns him into a crystal. While watching it I thought, “Yikes—that blonde bad guy is hot! Why are all those girls swooning over the guy in the cape? He’s not nearly as cute as the villain.” (True story.) So when Jadeite was crystallized, never to appear again, I determined that the show sucked and I wouldn’t watch it anymore.
This is also the year I met my best friend Leilani (name sound familiar?). And you all have her to thank for the fanfiction I’ve been writing the last ten years. She eventually forced me to watch more episodes of Sailor Moon and when I saw the romance unfolding between Serena and Darien (this is long before I knew their Japanese names), I fell for the show. Hard.
Then one day in ninth grade (age fourteen), Leilani sent me a link to a funny little site called A Sailor Moon Romance (RIP). The first fanfic I read was a male author-insert fic, where Tuxedo Mask died and the author became the new hero of the story and won Serena’s 
heart. The story was terrible, of course, but nevertheless the seed was planted in my heart. I had story ideas for Serena and Darien! I could write about them! And maybe people would actually read them! It was a dream come true.
The first fanfic I wrote was called “Remembering Love.” It was really bad, you won’t find it on this site, and I won’t tell you where you can find it.
I wrote fanfiction consistently for about three years. My parents complained that I didn’t go outside enough. One summer vacation was spent almost entirely in front of the computer (that was the summer “Royal Flush” and “A Million Kisses” were born). I had a journal filled with plot ideas. Most of them would never see the light of day but for a time I felt like I could go on writing fanfiction forever.
College
But by age eighteen I had begun to burn out after all. I had moved on to other animes, had ideas for original stories starting to fill my head, and was headed off to college where my work load was about to quadruple. I “retired” from the fanfiction world thinking that I would never return.
I majored in creative writing at Pacific Lutheran University—which is ironic because I was doing so much schoolwork at the time that I hardly ever wrote creatively. I did, however, work in bits and pieces on “The House on Thornrose Lane,” which started out as an original novel, not a fanfic. My love for anime persisted, though. I even started my college’s anime club, which continues to this day as one of the biggest clubs on campus.
I graduated at age twenty thanks to a program that let me skip two years of high school. I immediately started work at a book publisher in Seattle as a managing editor. I bought a house with my brother and a couple friends. Life was good, but busy. I wasn’t writing like I used to.
Back to Fanfiction
Then one day, while going about my own business, an idea struck me so hard it took my breath away. The idea was about a writer—a fanfiction writer—who gets sucked into the world of Sailor Moon, brought there for the purpose of uniting the two fated lovers before certain disaster can strike…
But I had retired from fanfiction. I didn’t think I wanted to get back into it again, because I knew how addicting it was and how hard it had been to leave in the first place. But the idea persisted, and grew, until one day I could take it no more. I sat down and typed up theopening scene, hoping that it would then leave me alone. But it didn’t. I had to keep writing and within a single day I had written nearly 10,000 words (which remained a personal record until I wrote “Linkshire,” more on that later). The story became “The Professional.” It would go on to win Best Romance and Best Overall Fanfiction of the Year, but more important than that, it had officially reignited my passion for Usagi and Mamoru (I knew—and could pronounce—their Japanese names by now).
That was almost four years ago and I’m still writing fanfiction today. I eventually decided to convert “Thornrose” to an alternate reality fanfic which gave me the boost I needed to finish it.
Adulthood, the Writing Life, and Publication
In 2006 I started grad school through Pace University’s online program. By the end of 2008 I will have a Master’s in Publishing.
Not long after starting classes I met my current boyfriend, Jesse. Though I can’t claim that he understands mypassion for writing, he has supported me from day one and never fails to encourage me when I’m having a bad writing day.
2006 was also the first year I participated in National Novel Writing Month. Which was a lot of fun balancing with work and school, but I completed the 50,000 words and then some. The story was called “To the Gentleman in the Back” and will eventually be posted to fanfiction.net—it is still in the revision stage but you can read a teaser for it on the Teasers page.
This is about the time I started treating writing more like the career I hoped it would someday be. I subscribed to writing newsletters and magazines and started reading books on the craft. I entered writing contests and made it a point to write most days of the week. For the first time I considered myself a real writer, not just someone who likes to dream about someone else’s characters.
Then one da
y I heard about a writing contest that sounded very appealing: a gothic romance contest. I had just finished reading Jane Eyre and had gothic romance on the brain. The idea for a story popped into my head almost immediately. I wrote the 17,000 word “novelette” in two days, sent it to a handful of friends to review on Friday, got their suggestions on Sunday, and revised and submitted the story on Monday (the contest deadline). The process of it was such a blur that I could hardly believe it when the editor contacted me a month later and told me I was one of the seven winners. My story was going to be published! It was one of the best moments of my life. The anthology was titled “Bound in Skin” and you can read more about it and order your copy on the Publications page, or read a teaser on the Teasers page.
Seeing my name in print gave me such a strong burst of energy. Since then I’ve started work on a new novel and started revising “Gentleman” which may one day be turned into an original story for publication. My goal is to start submitting a novel—any novel—to agents and editors in 2009.
And hopefully someday you will see my name on the cover of a book at your local bookstore and think, “I knew her when….”
And then you’ll buy it.
I hope. :P