Biographical Backstory

I spent my early childhood in various community theaters, prompting actors who’d forgotten their lines, running errands for carpenters and sound techs, and scrambling up eighteen-foot ladders to hang lighting instruments. As a young adult, I spent two seasons with a repertory theater company and a third performing in drag as a male whiskey trader at a living history museum before succumbing to my first passion, writing science fiction and fantasy.

I learned to write by writing. I wrote and wrote and wrote; then I went to Clarion West in 1995, got some excellent feedback, came home and wrote some more. With help from many patient teachers, editors and fellow writers, I got better. I’m working on getting better still.

Since 2013 I have been living in Toronto, Canada, where I study yoga, pursue the perfect espresso and take thousands of digital photographs. Those that don’t end up on Flickr can often be found on Instagram.

In 2003, I finished my first novel, Indigo Springs. It was a momentous summer: a few weeks after the novel went to market, the Supreme Court of B.C. ruled in favor of legalized same-sex marriage. A month later, I achieved a lifelong dream by marrying my long-term partner, author Kelly Robson, at one of our favorite places, the UBC Botanical Gardens.

After selling numerous short stories to a range of literary, mystery, fantasy and science fiction markets I saw the publication of Indigo Springs, my first book, came out in 2009, and promptly won the Sunburst Award for Canadian Literature of the Fantastic. Blue Magic, the sequel, was released in 2012 to rave reviews.

I then dove into a trilogy, The Hidden Sea Tales. The first book in the series, Child of a Hidden Sea, was released in June of 2014. The next, A Daughter of No Nation, was released in December 2015 and won the 2016 Prix Aurora for best novel. The final book in the series, The Nature of a Pirate, brought the series to a gut-wrenching conclusion.