Writer, editor, storytelling coach

Eat kale. Exercise. Take your vitamins. And write!

Yes, everyone should write for holistic wellness, whether life is good or not. Inspired by a decade facilitating writing workshops for cancer patients, domestic violence survivors, and others seeking inner truth and peace, Writing Through the Muck presents irrefutable benefits of wellness writing, various tools and techniques to help you tap deeply into memory and emotion,  a plethora of inspiring quotes and poems, and the author's personal stories from trudging through the muck.

Best of all, it guides you through a rich collection of writing prompts to help you find yourself, your story, and your way through tough times.

All author profits will be donated to organizations supporting cancer patients, domestic violence survivors, and climate change activists.

When Brooke sets off on a trail in Yellowstone National Park to train for an upcoming marathon, she is brutally attacked by a grizzly bear. One hundred forty years earlier, Anne accompanies her husband on a camping trip in the nation’s first national park and awakens one morning to find he’s been captured by Nez Perce warriors.

While under the care of American Indian women, both Brooke and Anne must learn to contend with this frightening but sacred landscape and  overcome multiple personal obstacles.

Alternating between contemporary and historical times, this award-winning story is based on the author's belief that women need each other in our complicated, male-dominated world.

A stunning collection of loosely linked stories in which women aged thirteen to ninety must face the unwelcome realities of their lives. Sometimes gritty, sometimes humorous, these ordinary women wrestle with family relationships, self-esteem, socioeconomic status, maternal obligations, and a universal need for independence.  

The women in this collection may or may not be the type you’d invite over for lunch. Some  are tough. Some aren’t all that likeable. Some might not see the world the way you do. But they’re compelling in their own right--even though they are fictional--as they reflect today's women who have come along a difficult path and who courageously take control of their lives.

Each story is enhanced by one of fourteen original poems contributed by talented poets specifically for this collection and its themes. Although the stories stand alone, they are further strengthened by the relationships among the various characters throughout the collection.

Readers of The Damnable Legacy will be delighted to find some of the characters from that novel appear here as wel

Lynn still regrets the decision she made thirty years ago to place her daughter for adoption so she could climb the highest mountains of the world. Frankie is the troubled biological granddaughter Lynn has never known. And Beth Mahoney is a minister’s wife with terminal cancer and the only one who knows the relationship between the two.

Narrated from the afterlife against the unforgiving Alaskan landscape,  The Damnable Legacy is a story about both love and survival, exploring the importance of attachment, place, and faith, and asking how far we should go to achieve our goals--and at what cost.

Also available on Audible!

Climate Abandoned: We’re on the Endangered Species List is an award-winning anthology of nonfiction essays by scientists and environmental experts about the hard truths, causes, and consequences of the climate crisis. Topics addressed include the greenhouse effect, declining biodiversity, our warming oceans, ideology vs. science, and other urgent topics.

The essay "Climate Stress" discusses how the crisis has caused a new chronic illness for many of us. Rising societal discord, worsening natural disasters, overall mounting fear for the wellbeing of our children and our species, and the burden of disbelief are all fueling higher levels of stress for parents, activists, and scientists. But it also gives tips for what you can do, or stop doing, to help.

Story is a crucial component of navigating the roller coaster of grief. The beautifully written stories and poems in Just a Little More Time share tender last moments with loved ones, muse about what happens when we die, and most of all celebrate and delight with tales of love.

Kretchmer's story "Song of the Tree Frog" revolves around the author's grief of having to move and/or being left behind.