Greetings!
Before I begin delving into reviews and articles, I figured I should follow in the footsteps of other new writers to The Pagan and the Pen and take some time to introduce myself.
Born and raised in southern New Hampshire, I loved writing from an early age. My friends and I would spend hours creating character profiles for superheroes, eventually leading ourselves to comic strips and digital graphic novels. After studying poetry in high school, I decided to pursue a career writing it.
Marie’s Book of Spells debuted in 2001 as a short book of spells and rituals. I had collected enough poetry by that time to begin working on my first volume and Car Chases & Fake Bologna (now Generational) was published in 2002. Its sequel, Apollo Weeps, was released in 2003. Both books contained poetry, journal entries, and bits of prose.
At this time, marketing and promoting your work without a budget was incredibly difficult. MySpace was just being invented in 2003. Facebook and Digg, two more social networking and bookmarking sites many authors find useful, wouldn’t find themselves in the public eye for another year. Aside from emailing zines, blogging, and releasing statements to traditional outlets like newspapers, magazines, and bookstores, it was very difficult for me to find anyone interested in my work.
I consequently felt like my efforts were neither warranted nor appreciated and removed my books from print until a point at which I could devote more time to them.
That time came this year. Each of my three original books are now available as second editions with ebook versions. Offering my titles as ebooks has broadened my audience and exposed a lot more people to my work. Additionally, my mother approached me about publishing her business’s collection of recipes as a cookbook. We spent several months working on Inside Glass Jar Goodies and the final product was released in print and as an ebook in November.
While I don’t know for certain what I’ll be writing about most often on The Pagan and the Pen, digital publishing is one of my favorite subjects. The Kindle store has made me exponentially happy. Two of my titles, Marie’s Book of Spells and Inside Glass Jar Goodies, have reached spots between numbers one and five on their bestsellers lists since November. The Pagan community especially can benefit from being more involved with this sort of media as the Kindle market is still incredibly small compared to the rest of Amazon.
My other interests include vegetarian cooking, crafts, photography, and travel. I am also very open to feedback. If you and I share an interest and you would like to see more of something specific as a reader, please let me know and I’ll see what I can do to oblige.
Thank you!
The Pagan & the Pen ~ An Online Magazine! 