If this is your first visit to my space here, let me start by first saying, “Welcome!”
By: Carolyn Mcbride
Tags: Writers Life, Author, Writers On Medium, Carolynmcbride, Writers On Writing

If this is your first visit to my space here, let me start by first saying, “Welcome!”

I’m going to assume that you either don’t know me or don’t know much about me, so let me introduce myself. (Forgive me if this sounds like a singles ad.)

My name is Carolyn, I’m Canadian (which explains what might look like odd spelling) and I’m a writer. I’ve been writing stories since I was old enough to make sentences. I’ve been a voracious reader for as long as I can remember, and not necessarily faithful to just one genre, either. When I was younger, I would have told you my favourite books were The Incredible Journey, Black Beauty and Watership Down. Eventually, I found science-fiction and fantasy and fell in love with the work of Arthur C. Clarke, Anne McCaffery, Piers Anthony and many others. I dabbled my reader-toes in nature & outdoors writings, comedy, young-adult, non-fiction (so many topics grab my attention here that it would take forever to list them all), and I tried on horror. As I grew up, I found scads more books to bury my nose in, across even more genres. I was, and still am, fascinated by the written word.

As I grew, the stories I wrote became more sophisticated. They included tales of people, not just animals. Some were happy, some were sad. Some were slices-of-life while others had real issues at heart. I am still writing. I have written science-fiction, speculative fiction, mystery, romance and psychological horror. I have written stories for children too, with a young dragon as the main character. (Prompted by parenthood and poverty). I have written flash fiction, short stories, a few essays and a couple of novels. I have been published in magazines and by a publishing house that has since closed up shop.I also write and release short stories that I publish myself as an Indie author. I currently have a mystery novel in development set in Northern Ontario (Canada) that I hope will become the foundation for a series, but I’ll tell you more about that another day.

In the interest of full disclosure, much, but not all, of what I write these days has lesbian characters. They’re not all running around kissing, snogging and moving in with each other all the time. To be honest, there’s not a lot of sex in my stuff at all. My characters are like me in at least one aspect — they are people first (albeit make-believe people) and gender last. Their stories are like everyone else’s. Okay, maybe not the serial killer’s story, but you know what I mean. I mention all this so that you’re fully aware that many of my characters might have girlfriends. Not all though. I do have characters that have boyfriends, male friends they hang out with and I also write about some terrific guys too. But some folks are squicked out by the thought of two women enjoying an adult, consensual relationship. If that’s you, no problem. I plan to make the majority of what I offer here grandmother-safe. (By which I mean that you could show your conservative grandmother that content without fear of scandalizing her.)

I love the idea of creating work that reaches across distances and connects people, and I hope that one of those people is you.