Every author has one, her own little Storybrooke, a place where the characters she creates become living, breathing entities, and the fantastical takes on a life of its own. My personal Storybrooke is superimposed over modern day Toronto, Ontario, where archaeologists seek explanations for the unexplained and revenants and other supernatural beings roam undetected and free. Lately, however, I find myself making brief, periodic trips to someone else’s Storybrooke, the one depicted on ABC’s Once Upon a Time.

The reason for this is simple: I teach Writers Craft and I need subject material for the exemplars I give my students. I could create something new, find my own characters and write about them, but that would take time, a precious commodity that I have so little of. Instead, I borrow OUAT’s characters. My students seem to like the idea. My own kids think I’m strange. I’m loving every minute of it.

So this is my blog. It’s my first on this site, though not my first ever and I suspect it won’t be my last. It’s a place I plan to post my exemplars taking place in Once Upon A Time’s Storybrooke, and whatever else I write that I don’t plan to have published elsewhere. Sometimes that might include glimpses into my own little Storybrooke as well.