About me 

I GREW UP AMIDST the vineyards and gently sloping hills of southern Germany. I spent most of my childhood with my nose buried in a book.

The writing bug bit me at the age of eleven. The very first piece of fiction I ever wrote was a thirty-page western story that I still have somewhere (well-hidden because it alternately makes me cringe and laugh when I read it today). I wrote two dozen mostly novel-length stories (westerns, adventure stories, historical fiction, fantasy, science fiction – you name it, I've probably written it) in my "baby years" as a writer, but no one but my poor twin sister ever got to read them.

That changed when I discovered the Internet and the wondrous world of FanFiction and online stories. My parents belatedly got their wish – I took my nose out of my books and started to spend my time glued to the computer screen instead. Soon after, I wrote my first FanFiction, a Star Trek: Voyager story. Don't bother to search for it on the web; even if there was still a copy in circulation somewhere, it's in German. Back then, I would have taken a thousand oaths that I would never, ever be able to write more than a grocery list in English. Then I took an intensive, free online language course – almost eight years of constant FanFic reading.

So in the beginning of 2006, I finally put my newly acquired knowledge of the English language to good use and wrote a series of three Law & Order: SVU FanFics in English. As my confidence grew, I wrote a longer FanFiction and then my first English historical fiction. In some ways, I've come full circle – because my novel "Backwards to Oregon" takes place on the Western Frontier. Other than the setting, I promise that it doesn't have much in common with my first childish attempt at writing.

I still live in Germany, where I work as a psychologist. When I'm not working or writing, I like to spend my time (beta)reading, going out with friends, spending time with my nieces and nephew, and watching way too many crime shows. I also like taking a walk around one of two lakes close to my home and thinking up new story ideas.

 

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