About

(updated as of June 2012)

For the moment I have abandoned the pre-set schedule I tried to keep up with last year and part of this year.  With my crazy schedule it was simply not working.  However, the kinds of things I write about will remain essentially the same.  Here you will find book reviews and other book-related posts, reviews of movies and tv shows, a large focus on science fiction and fantasy, a variety of geek-related interests, rants about academics, and science, the occasional foray into political topics (though I mostly avoid them when I can), and, of course, much talk about my writing and writing in general.

Bio:

In elementary school, I read Jane Austen and J.R.R. Tolkien.  In middle school, I read Charlotte Bronte and Frank Herbert.  In high school, I read William Gibson, Neil Gaiman, and Tim O’Brien.  In college, I read everything I could get my hands on.  All the while, I daydreamed about magic, about orbital space stations, about adventure.  And I scribbled little notes and half-formed stories about crazy places and crazier people.

In my head, dragons roam the skies, demons and hunters are locked in eternal battle, and princesses tend to do the rescuing.  In my head, space stations orbit the earth, computers are sentient, and aliens walk among us.  Now, with renewed determination, I have set myself the task of showing these things to the world.

Now, I am a fantasy/scifi writer with only my pen to help me beat back mundane existence – shouting from the rooftops that magic still exists and it is here, all the while laughing in the faces of those who fear I have at last gone mad.

To that end, I I took the year between Summer 2010 and Summer 2011 off from school in order to write.  During that time, I started and completed the first draft of my WIP: Midnight’s Knife, which is an urban fantasy about a demon hunter who works for a secret order within the Catholic Church, meant to protect the world from the influence/existence of demons and magic.  The main character of Midnight’s Knife is Gabrielle Wrath, who, on top of dealing with a new demon threat, must deal with questions about her sexuality and her relationship with her faith and the Catholic Church.

As of Fall 2011, I began my Ph.D. in English and American Literature, as well as continuing as a English Dept. Doctoral Teaching Fellow.  As such I will be taking three courses a semester, as well as teaching First-Year Writing courses.  I will spend the next five years both writing papers and grading them.  My main areas of interest are American Contemporary Literature, Postmodernism, and Genre Fiction.  And I will be teaching college freshmen how to write coherent essays and research papers.

While this will surely take up a great deal of my time and energy, I hope to simultaneously continue my blogging activities here, as well as working on revisions of Midnight’s Knife.

For the curious, my credentials are:

B.A. in English Literature from Rockhurst University, with a minor in Theology (2008)

M.A. in English and American Literature from University of Houston (2010)

Ph.D. in English and American Literature, with specialty in American Postmodernism from University of Houston (in progress – projected graduation year: 2016)

I also have half of a Physics degree that I intend to finish someday, a handful of anthropology and women studies courses under my belt, and a voracious appetite for learning.  I am an omnivore in every sense of the world: willing to read, learn, listen to, (and eat) just about anything you put in front of me.

Come join in the fun, and drop me a line every once in awhile.  I get lonely easily. ^_^

*Side Note: the header image is a gift from my great friend, Nathan Wilson.