I discovered Trixie Belden at the age of nine, when I read The Gatehouse Mystery at my older cousin’s house. At the time, I’m not sure if I realized it was part of a series, but later that same year a friend gave me a beat-up copy of Secret of the Mansion... from then on, I was hooked! My two sisters and I devoured each new Trixie as we found it, even reciting chunks of dialog while doing the dishes at night. However, as I matured into my teens, I put my Trixies away in favor of other reading matter. They remained safely at my parents’ house for the next 30 or so years, until my parents decided to sell their house. They warned all of their children that any books we wanted needed to be picked up because they were donating excess books to charity. I took my Trixies home, reread them, and enjoyed them as much as ever!

At that point I had no idea that the series had continued past 16 books – in fact, I had bought #16 for my much-younger sister after I was married, but never saw any later books. When I discovered the online Trixie community, I was absolutely amazed that there were not only more books in the series, but tons of fanfiction out there! I joined the communities of Zap’s and Jixemitri after reading some of the fanfic, and have met some great people through those two sites.

After reading a lot of stories, I began to think of some stories of my own,and my first story was posted at Misty’s Trixiefic site. A longer story written for the fifth anniversary of Jix led me to the lovely Vivian, who offered me space at her site and help with graphics. Several stories later and after tons of encouragement, I decided to apply for Jix author status, and I’m thrilled to be a part of the Jix author community!

My stories tend to be traditional—I do like the traditional pairings. I write a lot about Diana and her family; they don’t seem to have been developed as much and it seems there is more scope with them. I admire some writers and their universes so much that I am a little nervous of writing a lot about Jim and Trixie! The parents are also fascinating to me, now that I am the parent of grown children.

In my spare time, I enjoy creating graphics, exercise, cooking, reading, and selling books online.

If you love to write, Jixemitri offers writing challenges from time to time—usually twice a year. Here are buttons signifying some of the challenges I've completed.

 

An annual small-group writing weekend, apart from Jix