I grew up on the American River in Sacramento, California, and started my career in the Silicon Valley writing about technology. A few of my other features include wearing my novel at Burningman, and publications in The San Francisco Chronicle, The Marin Independent Journal, Numero Cinq, Medium, Women's eNews, Outdoor Magazine, and Hunger Mountain. I've an MFA from the Vermont College of Fine Arts and a B.A. from California Polytechnic State University. I've worked as a lifeguard, ski instructor, and radio disc jockey. I'm a member of the Castro Writers' Cooperative, the Lit Camp Advisory Board, the Historical Novel Society and the San Mateo Public Library Literary Society.
A fanatical enthusiasm for California history led me on a quest to discover women’s contributions in building the West. The result is my debut novel—Prospects of a Woman. An excerpt entitled "Shifting in California" won 1st place in the California Writer's Club short story contest and is published in the Fault Zone Shift Anthology.
Prospects of a Woman features real women throughout history who helped build California, shattering that old male western stereotype of the hapless barmaid waiting around a dusty saloon for a brave cowboy or sheriff to rescue her. Take care of her. Make her an honest woman. Not so in California. In reality, California women weren't waiting around for a man, but were working to build the fast-growing society of the West. They were fiercely independent. Powerful. Far from hapless. The roots of California women go deep, growing out of the social, economic, and political climate upon statehood in 1850.