I love writing in all of its forms, from fiction to legal briefs. As an adolescent (and admitted nerd), I spent hours in my room creating characters and constructing sentences. I went on to serve as features editor of my high school newspaper in Green Bay, Wisconsin. In college, while others complained about required reading and term papers, I couldn’t believe my good luck. Through my double major in English and Spanish, I had the privilege of delving into literature and writing in not one but two languages.
After graduating from the University of Notre Dame in 2001, I moved to Madison for law school and immediately fell in love with the city. I wrote a blurb about Madison that was published in Delaying the Real World: A Twentysomething’s Guide to Seeking Adventure, by Colleen Kinder (Running Press, 2005). I continued to write creatively in law school, but also learned about a different kind of writing—the persuasive and analytical world of legal writing.
After getting my law degree I spent two years in Chicago, working at a large law firm in the Loop. In Chicago, I participated in The Writer’s Loft workshop run by author and former Northwestern writing professor Jerry Cleaver. I moved back to Madison in 2006, where I practice law and live with my husband and our neurotic but lovable dog. In my spare time (what there is of it) I write fiction, but I am also interested in breaking into food and travel writing.
I recently finished my first novel, EXcelente. The story opens with its heroine, twenty-eight-year-old Lucy Sheridan, slogging through the worst day of her life. Worn out and rain-soaked, she comes home from a day of law firm drudgery to find her live-in boyfriend, Mark, packing up his belongings and moving out of their apartment in Chicago’s vibrant Northalstead neighborhood. The story follows lovelorn Lucy as she questions her relationship with Mark and with herself, on an international and introspective journey involving hilarious mishaps, old and new friends, and lots of good food and wine.
