Becoming a mother cannot help but change things. An author's life is reflected in their writing, whether they want it to be or not, and parenthood is one of the biggest life changes there is.

I'm mostly a novelist these days, but I have written short stories in Fantasy, Science Fiction and horror.

I have to do more close research and fact checking for the science fiction. This is not however to say that writing good fantasy does not involve doing good research.

Octavia Butler, of course, is brilliant and disturbing.

If I get blocked, it is generally because I don't know enough about some aspect of the story or the characters. The answer for this is generally more research, or making more background notes, so the place and person can be more fully realized inside my own mind.

I myself was born in Sacramento, California in 1966.

I suppose if I was to have to pick a few, Ursula LeGuin would have to top the list. It was while reading her work that I decided I wanted to be an author.