Who I Am

Hi, thanks for dropping by.  My new novel is out this June! To preorder: The Worst Kind of Girl

©Sandra Goodin Photography

I write and read in Joshua Tree, California, where I’ve lived since 2017. I grew up in Connecticut and did a long stretch in the suburban South, but the desert is home. Here, I have a beloved writing community and many opportunities to support my fellow writers.

In the past, I was a Senior Book Buyer for Baker & Taylor, working with the most volatile bestsellers by the time I left. For three years I edited weekly small press book reviews at Necessary Fiction. My Creative Writing MA is from Lancaster University, UK.

For a while I owned a tiny used bookstore in New York’s Hudson Valley. It was there I found inspiration for my debut novel, Not On Fire, Only Dying (Twisted Road Publications, 2015), an SPD Fiction Bestseller.

My “multimedia micro memoir,” Utility Location, was published by Bottlecap Press in 2022. My flash prose is collected in two chapbooks: Whatever Feels Like Home (above/ground press, 2021), and Swap / Meet (Space Cowboy Books, 2018).

In 2018, in a moment of Trump-induced rage, I created World Split Open Press to publish Feckless Cunt: A Feminist Anthology and, more recently, And That Was That: An Abortion Memoir by Bonnie Brady.

Hoping to continue the conversation started by the Anthology, in 2019 I created the “feminist, queer, and otherwise radical” Desert Split Open. Every other month, we meet for the Desert Split Open Mic. Occasionally, I interview local and visiting authors. My own short fiction, creative nonfiction, and multimedia work can be found in numerous, wonderful places, online and in print. Find a complete list here.

Questions? Contact me at desertsplitopen @ gmail.com.
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