I grew up with an ‘80s perm and a writerly spirit in Oregon’s moody Coastal Mountain Range. Loggers, storytellers, songwriters, and renegades starred as feature characters across my childhood.

A sturdy stack of seasoned firewood was cause for lengthy conversation at family reunions. One great-grandfather had a pet parrot that he taught to ride on his shoulder and curse on command. My family owned a logging company whose night watchman was a man named Muskrat (real name unknown); he lived in an RV that smelled like death on remote logging sites with no running water, and a dog named Bowser.

My high school English teacher was a hippie whom my grandfather picked up as a hitchhiker back in the ‘70s after coming upon her walking with her baby and husband on a remote gravel road in the forest. Years later, that woman taught me how to capture a connection to nature and a sense of place in my writing.

I always wanted to write a book with a female protagonist as the maverick who rides off into the western horizon with nothing but freedom and inspiration on the other side.

Hailing from the working class, I felt pressured to take a more business-focused approach to my future, so I pursued a career in marketing and have spent 16 years as a brand strategist in the agency space.

Tired of creating PowerPoints that nobody would ever read, I returned to my writerly roots several years ago when I began taking online tutorials, writing courses, and participating in writing groups, teaching myself how to write my first novel in real-time.

I still work as a marketing consultant by day and find great joy in helping my clients grow their businesses. I write in my spare time, mostly over on Substack.

In the spirit of the work itself, I opted to self-publish my first novel, Something of Yourself, through IngramSpark and Amazon.