About

As a writer of Canadian historical fiction about strong female characters, my interest in women’s lives has been an enduring one. An undergraduate degree in Psychology from the University of Guelph led me to start an agency to help victims of domestic violence.

I followed up a stint as a prison guard with an M.A. degree in Criminology from the University of Toronto. Inspired to complete a Ph.D. in English from York University, I analyzed Canadian women’s writing from the “identity years” of 1965-1980. After a teaching career, I now devote my efforts to speaking and writing as an author.

My stories envision women who buck convention, whether that be from braving new territory geographically, socially, or professionally. Mingled with fictional characters are real world women who showed the way for courageous adventures. In these stories, we meet sharpshooter Annie Oakley, who befriends a fictional character Abigail Peacock at a pivotal time in both their lives. We meet Isobel Gunn, an Orkney woman who disguised herself as a man to board the Hudson’s Bay Company as a male employee in the fur trade. Marie-Anne Gaboury insisted on accompanying her husband from Quebec out to the prairies at a time when no other non-Indigenous woman had ventured there. And there is Belinda Pompey, who threw caution to the wind in the 1970s to defend her own autonomy.

Interest in female lives is taking a new turn as my spouse and I expand our tribe from two sons to two granddaughters born in 2023.