I was born in the Denver, Colorado suburb of Westminster in 1961, but I have always had a country heart. My favorite childhood memories are of campouts with my family. Whether digging for ant lions beneath a towering red sandstone cliff, its base adorned with the too-bright green of scrub oak leaves, or creeping along the needle-carpeted floor of a forest stalking a deer, I loved to explore. I often made up stories of adventure and intrigue while I roamed. I still do.

 Pursuing my love for animals and wilderness, I earned a Bachelor’s Degree in Wildlife Biology from Colorado State University in 1983, which allowed me to participate in studies of bobcats, pronghorn antelope, and forest habitat. I also led backpack trips with teenagers in the Pacific Northwest and in Colorado during my college years. But career prospects were bleak when I graduated, so I took seasonal positions. A forest inventory job gave me more wilderness experience, but most of my jobs involved waiting tables or working at a ski area.

One of the most fortunate consequences of my college experience was meeting my life partner, Joe. We plumbed the seasonal job market together after leaving school until, in July of 1985, we married. A month later we bought Wilderness Aware, a whitewater rafting company, which we moved to the small mountain town of Buena Vista, Colorado. That is where we still live today, having owned Wilderness Aware for twenty-three years.

 During my years of youth and immortality, I guided raft trips, trained guides, managed the office and drove the shuttle buses. I soaked up the beauty and wildness of the rivers and gathered stories of the journeys. Some of them I wrote in journals, and some went into our company newsletter. Our business was anchored in the belief that wilderness will only be valued and preserved if it is shared with average people who otherwise might never experience it. Wilderness Aware has earned two Colorado Company of the Year awards and is going strong.

When my father died and my thirties dawned, I looked around and found that I had a past in addition to a future, and I felt time slipping away. While Joe continued as rafting CEO, I became the accountant so I could stay home with our two children. The day I became a mother my world transformed into high definition full color.

In between chasing my two little human rainbows, I raised and trained llamas for thirteen years. The calm intelligence of these regal animals taught me patience, and training them brought great satisfaction. My sons rode llamas on backpacking trips and in parades, and they took them to school for show and tell. We still count two llamas among our family members, the last geriatric remnants of those years. A large golden retriever and a small furry hamster complete our current animal menagerie.

My sons are now sixteen and twelve. We travel as a family (without the furry members), and have visited Africa, Vietnam, the Dominican Republic, Mexico, the Caribbean, Peru, and Alaska. We come home from each trip with a better understanding of ourselves and of how all people are fundamentally the same regardless of culture.

 My passion for novel writing has grown with my accumulation of life experiences. I have completed three novels and am working on another story. For me, writing fiction is a way to explore the world outside and within myself, a way to reach for understanding and joy, and a way to share those things with others. I value history and each person’s place in it, wilderness and our relationship to it, and the power of love.