I’m a Word Witch, through and through. Author, screenwriter, and the creator of Writing Through the Body™ — a method that couples the foundational elements of fiction with the seven main chakras of the body — because fully inhabiting a character’s heart, mind, and soul is how we make it possible for them to become real on the page.

My debut novel, Miranda’s Garden, is out in the world now, published under my own imprint, Dark Moon Lilith Press. It’s been a long time coming, and I’m proud of every strange, unexpected, and difficult mile of it.

I’m a retired adjunct professor of writing, with degrees in Fiction Writing, English/Film Studies, Women’s Studies, and Digital Arts. My most meaningful classroom experience was the three years I spent teaching fiction writing and screenwriting to Adults in Custody.

When I’m not writing, reading, or binge watching, with Iris — my lovely and complicated feline familiar — by my side, you might find me hiking or snowshoeing the Oregon backcountry, dancing out and about or in my kitchen, or seeking solace at some far-flung mountain location.

Diverse stories and voices belong in the world. No matter how strange or taboo they may seem.

Stories heal both the writer and the reader. When we commit to telling the truth on the page — even in fiction, maybe especially in fiction — we lighten the loads we carry, and the products of our creative labor offer that lightening to others. It’s alchemical. I’ve seen it happen too many times to call it anything else.

Books change us. They help us make change.

Stories can heal the world.

Writing is messy. It asks hard things of us. It brings to the surface what we’d rather leave alone. It can move slowly and then all at once. It can move us and surprise us — shock us, even. That’s why I call it “rough magic.” It transforms, but not always gently, and rarely on a schedule.

I’ve been inside the rough magic of writing long enough to know what it looks like from every angle — the resistance, the breakthroughs, the chapters that won’t come, the ones that arrive uninvited. I’ve written through it myself, and I’ve sat beside other writers doing the same for years.

Miranda and I had an agreement when I was writing her story: I would tell it with honesty and integrity, and she would show me what I needed to see. That’s the same agreement I bring to every writer I work with.