Hello, and sorry for the info dump of an introduction!

Hi, All,

A little background on me and where I'm at in my writing journey -

I was a devourer of stories from an early age, especially fantasy and history (early influencers were Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, Chronicles of Narnia, Series of Unfortunate Events, the Dear/My America books, and anything by Gail Carson Levine), and by the time I was entering high school I had been bitten by the Jane Austen bug (I may or may not have had a birthday sleepover in middle school forcing my friends to watch the full 1995 BBC adaptation of Pride & Prejudice). From the time I was around eight years old, my family visited Gettysburg yearly, and our fifth grade librarian recited for us her own, age-appropriate version of The Odyssey (I can still recite the song about the island of lotus-eaters). Thus began my history obsession.

I dabbled in creative writing in middle school, but high school came around, and despite the fact that I loved to read and was developing as a strong writer, I never seriously considered publishing anything of my own (becoming an author always seemed to me an impractical or improbable pipe dream). I took whatever English literature and history courses I could throughout high school, and I applied to colleges under the Englit programs with the goal of going into the publishing field. During college, I was persuaded by some excellent professors to add history as a double-major, in addition to my Certificate in Children's Literature. Throughout college, however, I came to realize three things: first, I wanted to continue my education, second, that my love of literature was very much born from my love of history and not the weeds of literary theory, and third, I really couldn't see myself living in NYC. I interned at the local historical society and caught the public history itch.

I earned my MA in History in central NY, studying early American history, gender studies, print culture, the Atlantic world, and museum studies. Afterwards, my boyfriend (now husband) and I moved to Upstate NY, and I've spent the past six and a half years doing curatorial, research, exhibits, and grant writing work for historic house museums.

Three years ago, I finally began to read for fun again, and regularly (my pleasure reading had been virtually killed by grad school). Looking for something that would be easy to get into, I picked up my copies of Cinda Williams Chima's Seven Realms series, which I had loved in high school, and found myself totally swept away once more. I can't really explain why or how it happened, but re-discovering my love of reading through those books kindled a new fire, allowing me to seriously consider, for the first time in many years, that maybe, just maybe, I could also create something that people could lose themselves in.

Since then, I've started two novel-length projects I've set aside for now, and I am now working on a third, much more grounded in what I've learned over the years about how to write a novel and craft compelling stories. My current WIP takes place in a world inspired by WWI and WWII and involves espionage, the forgetting and erasure of history, Death magic, gods that may or may not exist, technology and warfare and their moral quandaries, and romance. After many rounds of outlines and revisions, I'm nearly a fourth of the way through Draft Zero, which I'm writing by hand because that's just how my brain works.

Things are slow-going, and I know I'm not alone in finding it very difficult to figure out a writing routine while working full time with a long commute and family and other life commitments. I'm also lacking a writing community to bounce ideas off of and learn from, which is a major reason I'm excited to join this group.

This is probably far too much for now, but I've always been an over-writer....

What is everyone else working on??

2 comments