I grew up in the piney woods of East Texas where MY SUMMER DARLINGS, THE HUNTING WIVES and BIG WOODS are set. After college, I moved to San Francisco where I studied Victorian Literature for my Master's, and gravitated towards that era's detective novels, known as "sensation novels", such as Wilke Collins' THE WOMAN IN WHITE. I then lived in Los Angeles for a few years where I worked for filmmaker/writer Ron Shelton and his wife, the actress Lolita Davidovich.

I currently live in Austin, Texas, with my husband and son where we enjoy traipsing around the area’s many beautiful parks. I also enjoy napping, staring into space, making to-do lists for my to-do lists, shoveling cookies down my throat when I'm writing a particularly difficult scene (and even when I'm not), wearing my PJ’s as often as I can get away with and collapsing into bed at the end of a day with a great book.

I'm currently finishing a book about the late, jazz great, Rahsaan Roland Kirk, a project which has been in the works for twenty years. Kirk was a human phenomenon—a multi-instrumentalist who was best known for his miraculous ability to play three saxophones simultaneously. During his brief life, he defied staggering odds—from blindness, to prejudice, to a paralyzing stroke—in order to play the music that came to him through dreams. His story is what made me want to become a writer.

My writing has appeared in The Washington Post, The Rumpus, Austin Monthly, and Texas Highways Magazine.

My proudest achievement remains clinching 1st place in the UIL competition for Personal Writing when I was in the 4th grade.