Stories

My Professional Journey

By day, I am an English Literature Professor, Translator, and Certified Cambridge English Teacher. By night, I write YA, NA Contemporary fiction. I love taking my readers on emotional roller coasters with relatable, flawed characters that go through life seeking personal growth and self-acceptance. I'm a fierce advocate for mental health, so my stories have a strong emphasis in a path towards healing.

Unless

June 23 2019

Nineteen-year-old Noah Riley wakes up disoriented, soaked to the bone, and alone on the shores of Rockaway Beach, Brooklyn, NY. After a night of wallowing in self-loathing, a Jägermeister, and drunken, dumb choices, he has no clue who pulled him out of the water except for a Polaroid and this unfamiliar, black hoodie he is now wearing. Searching for answers as his life unravels and past secrets ravage his sanity, he finds a love that challenges his self-identity and drives him to find meaning in his life. Now, at the turn of the tide, he'd better learn how to make friends with his worst fear: living. Think second chances, new beginnings, and gay romance.

Opening Paragraph:

Rockaway Beach, New York. (3 am)

The sudden pull of the ocean takes me by surprise—and I thought I was an excellent swimmer, go figure. What started off as a whimsical, self-dare is turning into my last wrong choice. I'm sinking, dragged to the bottom of this dark vastness. Fire fills my lungs as if Poseidon himself grips and squeezes my chest. Deafening me are the funeral drums of my stubborn heart, calling to my ancestors, warning them of my impending arrival.

This ocean is reluctant to take any more of my bullshit, so it shoves inside my mouth, invading every aching cell of my reckless body. Damn it, I shouldn't have smoked weed to begin with. I'm so high the seabed seems alive. There are creatures in there waiting for my demise. They ache to feed on the remains of my wistful sadness. I'm also drunk. Part of me knows it is not possible for my stomach to be brimming with flotsam, but this impending heaviness begs to differ—I'm a shipwreck after all. Rejected and worthless. A dying mess.

Forget Me Lots

Feb 01 2020

Much against his will, River Allen can't drag his gaze away from the new student, seventeen-year-old Dawn Gray Brooks. It isn't that she lives in a ragged, pink dress, and carries a thick, leather fairytale book around. There is something hidden in her faraway expression... Something he can't figure out-which leads him to follow her to Elsie's Lake. What he finds will change his life forever.

❀ Dawn Gray Brooks knows how to keep secrets. She doesn't tell anyone anything. Not a word about how she can float away from her body and watch the world unfold. She doesn't tell anyone about her daily talks with Dad either. Why? Because he's dead. Dawn knows better than to explain about her voices... Until River comes along, and Dad's words start to disappear. This boy refuses to leave her alone, keeping her in the now, clinging to reality. But for how long?

❀ Forget me Lots tell the adventures of a watery boy that has fallen for a whirlwind girl. A heart-wrenching journey brimming with love and grief, family, and friendship. It explores the bewildering places our minds can take us and will remind you of your own first love and how deep it pulled you under.

Opening paragraph:

He needed to stop trying to find her, he just couldn't afford it anymore.

He hated himself for it though, for the times she came back to him were still worth the struggle and its sour aftertaste. She enjoyed coming within layers upon layers of dreams, dreams that brought back all the memories, memories that brought back everything they had gone through.

It wasn't a matter of currency, as if he could keep paying the piper for more chances. No. This wasn't about that at all. His time had run out, so he just stood there, his heart waning away with each tick, unable to beat without the warmth from her almond-brown eyes.

Missing the inexplicable tide that flooded his insides every time the sun cast shadows from her lashes onto her cheeks—his own grown so damn pale now—he decided on the way to end it.