From an early age, I developed a fondness for books and can recall my mother reading children’s picture books to me at bedtime. My favorites were the books in the Madeline series, and my mother’s storytelling abilities made me feel as though I were one of the little girls at the Catholic school Madeline attended in Paris. When I was able to read on my own, she would take me to the library, where I chose books such as Charlotte’s Web, The Secret Garden, and every single Mrs. Piggle Wiggle book. I began to cherish the characters, settings, and plots from works such as these, and yearned to be transported into other worlds and seeing their surroundings. I became captivated by how these authors were able to provide me with vivid descriptions of characters, creatures, and places that only my mind’s eye could see.

Over the past couple of decades, I have accumulated dozens of journals filled with writings that are comprised of my personal issues, dilemmas, and triumphs. As a dual major at Southern New Hampshire University, next summer, I will be receiving my B.A. in Creative Writing with a concentration on fiction, as well as a B.A. in History with an emphasis on European History. Through my study of history, I have a number of notebooks filled with my personal notes on various time periods. In particular, as a history major, I’ve studied Ancient Greece and Rome, the Middle Ages in Europe, the Italian Renaissance, the Reformation and early modern Europe, World War I and II, and the colonization of America. I have a keenness for going back into the past and recovering long forgotten women in history. Even more so, I have a fascination with developing them into characters with positive traits and negative flaws.

When I’m not traveling back in time to study and research the past to find forgotten women with colorful experiences in picturesque settings to use as story ideas, I’m often writing in my journal, crafting short fiction, or laboring over my novel, while being accompanied by four furry cats and two yapping yorkies.