How do you boil an entire personality down into just a few words?
Heck, I can’t even boil down a story into a synopsis!
But when I was revamping my website for the relaunch, my mother asked me what my personal brand was. She was the one actually doing the work, and she needed a direction to take the website in. But I didn’t really know how to answer. I’d never stopped to think about how I’d describe myself and my writing style.
When I started writing, way back in the day, it was mostly FanFic stuff. We will not go into detail about that because it’s more embarrassing than I care to admit – but let’s just say my romance writing started young. There was always a Happily Ever After.
Then there were all the Goosebumps (literally all of them) and the introduction of horror movies. I watched Freddy Kreuger at 6, from behind a chair mostly, but that was the movie that started it all. At one point in life, the Blockbuster Video by our house was out of horror movies that I hadn’t seen! The guy who worked there knew me well enough to know what alternatives to suggest – including documentaries on real life oddities.
My first true horror novel was Steven King’s Kujo at about 11 years old, which gave me the flavor of horror writing. I’d been watching movies for years, but reading it was something else entirely. Everyone knows movies and books are rarely ever the same. Pacing is different, foreshadowing is done differently, building suspense is something else entirely – and I wanted to do that.
My first “horror” story was written in 5th grade, when I rewrote R. L. Stine’s Night of the Living Dummy to personalize it for my life and my class: Night of the Living Kong. Kong being the stuffed monkey our teacher used to reward our good behavior. But she recognized the potential I had, and she read that story to future classes for years. Talk about bolstering a young writer’s confidence.
Sometime in high school, I wrote a story about cursed lawn gnomes coming to life and killing off my friends… and it was a HIT! No joke. Weirdly, my friends that I hadn’t killed in the first story requested a second one in which they were murdered. Weird request, but of course I obliged, killing one friend by drowning her in nacho cheese. Yeah, that happened… and she loved it! Both stories had their own amorous elements, and the hopeless romantic in me still kept the Happily Ever After… well, for me. Less so for the friends I killed off.
These days, I still love horror stories and criminal psychology. I listen to hard rock and I work out every morning. I trained in Krav Maga and Savate kickboxing, and I have a hard time at haunted houses, because I can’t not react physically when someone comes at me – and you’re not allowed to touch the actors or they throw you out… yeah, that’s a thing.
But also, I love playing ukulele. I seriously enjoy puzzles and hand-making greeting cards. I snuggle any and all animals, and I’ve been told on more than one occasion that I see the world very differently than other people. I have matured, yes – but I don’t think I’ve quite “grown up”. I still find adventures in the silliest of things, and I don’t need much to entertain myself and be happy. Somehow, as an adult, I can still be described as “adorable” – and I love that.
So yes, most of my writing is dark with supernatural creatures and dystopian aspects – but I never gave up that thread of romance and optimism. Happily Ever Afters these days are a little less happy, but still a necessity. That is my style, that is my brand. Dark, but hopeful. Hard, but promising. Strong, but vulnerable.
And so my personal brand boiled down to:
Adorably Creepy Badass
