I'm Libertarian, Unitarian, and generally contrarian-- not to mention a pedant who's convinced she's always right! Oddball and crank, that's me. But an oddball and crank with a quirky sense of humor, who loves to laugh, and could no more give up singing than breathing. I met my (equally-eccentric) husband in a Star Trek fan club; we've passed our silver anniversary and have a perceptive young-adult son who long ago picked up on the fact that we're weird. (He's used to it by now, despite being surprisingly non-nerdy himself.) We also have three much-loved kitties.

I got my first bit of fanwork, a poem, published -- yes, published. In a fanzine. I'm old! -- in 1976, and have been writing fanfic, fan poems, and filk (yes, that's the correct spelling) off-and-on ever since. I've edited a number of fanzines (mostly Star Trek: Voyager) and contributed to more. On-line this is actually the best place to find fanfic by me, though I have some work scattered on other sites, including Ao3. You can see I've branched out a bit from Trek, though that will always be my first fannish love.

As an author, I like to think of myself as a craftsperson, shaping my little works with care. My perfectionist tendencies and my relatively short attention span, though, do make completing longer works problematic. (Which is all the explanation you're going to get for why "Chakotay's Holidays" took 14 years!) I wouldn't post a creation of mine if I didn't think it was at least decent, but I do have favorites. Of those that appear on this site, my personal pets are "Little Boy Blue and the Man in the Moon" and "There Will Your Heart Be Also" (ST: VOY), "The Cogenitor's Tale" (ST: ENT), and "Elegy for Bail Organa" (SW, and the only Shakespearean sonnet I've ever written!).

As a reader, I enjoy fics with well-written characters and a sense of humor. Good drama can hook me like nobody's business, though, and decently-done melodramas are among my favorite guilty pleasures. My readerly turn-offs include most Mary Sues (yes, I understand the impulse to write them, but that doesn't mean I want to read them), canon characters acting out-of-character, and really bad grammar. I refuse to read anything whose summary indicates it was written during class or in a study hall, not because I dislike works by younger writers -- some of my favorite stories are by teenage writers -- but because I have learned the hard way that that usually means the story in question hasn't been proofread, and may make my aging eyes bleed.

If you want to compliment my work, OR to offer me constructive criticism, I welcome either! But I feel very strongly that whether or not you review is up to you. That's why none of my stories carry a "read and review" request: I don't think I'm entitled to praise or constructive advice, unless you wish to give either. If you do, thanks! One request: if you think a story of mine is fine but you're going to pretend in your head that it's about a different character or pairing (this has happened; some of my relationship stories feature offbeat pairings), well, okay, but please don't tell me that in your review, if you give one. I like the pairing I actually used, go figure!

People have told me I don't look like what they'd expect from reading my writing. I didn't know what that meant until a friend explained affectionately (well, she said it was affectionate!) that I look like a geek who shouldn't be capable of stringing two sentences together, and instead I string them together by the carloads.