Born in Wales, brought up in England, and emigrated to the USA, I've zigzagged through a motley slew of professions from playing unofficial British spy—yes, really!—while keeping a troupe of touring ballet dancers happy—oxymoron?—to editing a course on everything you wanted to know about astronomy. I've herded cats—oops! I mean I've worked in orchestral management, and I've taught piano and music theory—amazing how many people ain't got rhythm. Every step in this career maze was fun—well, sometimes only in retrospect—and full of opportunities to write on a wild range of topics from business law to Beethoven.
After my curiosity was piqued by learning that the streets are paved with gold in the United State, I gravitated to Virginia where I threw myself—not literally of course—into editing and writing nonfiction, mostly for adults.
I discovered the magic of writing for children a few years ago. Some of my articles were published in Stories for Children Magazine and the very generous knowonder! magazine published, in its entirety, my chapter book, Dewi, the Red Dragon, about an adventurous Welsh dragon detective. Children's books cast their spell on me as a child and I've been bewitched ever since. When my son was small, I enjoyed reading him stories at bedtime as much as I had enjoyed listening to my parents reading stories to me when I was a kid. I'm enchanted by the wonderful mix of innocence, escapism, imagination, and humor that bubbles out of stories for children, and it's no secret that kids who read and listen to stories develop a strong foundation for their emotional well-being as well as for the intellectual and social skills they'll need as they grow up.
Did I say "grow up"? I'm not sure I have because I still find the world of children's stories absolutely fascinating. I hope you do too, especially if you're an adult because it's pretty boring being nothing but a stuffy old grown-up.