Jen Fryar

Hoo boy.

I’ve started more diaries in my life than I can count—dozens of journals, notebooks, spiral bound, composition—you name it; the first ten pages were filled in a week before it wound up under the bed or in a rarely-used purse. 

That’s what this feels like. Like I just wrote “Dear Diary” at the top of a crisp white page in sparkly gel pen. Or fountain pen. Depends on if this is my eighth grade or 27-year-old journal. Ooh, or that shiny Japanese pen I got at that stationary store in Lowell. Where did I put that one?

Ahem. The difference between this and all those diaries is numerous, but the most obvious—and the one I must remind myself of, so as not to go on another tangent about pens—is that it is being read. By you. Whoever you are.

I decided to build this website for a few reasons: I have finally come out of my little author shell just enough to start sending out my work to publications, so I figured I should have somewhere for potential readers to find more of my work, as more of it is published. I also am working on other creative endeavors, such as a podcast through my work called Shelf Talkers, all about books and bookish things in general. And, of course, a place to put my thoughts into the void, and maybe have the void speak back once in a while.

But the void does not know who I am. Not really, not yet. So allow me to introduce myself.

My name is Jen. I am a New Englander by birth, a traveler by blood, a writer by calling and a napper by necessity. I prefer tea to coffee, would rather watch a horror movie than a comedy, and will read anything with “gothic” in the description. I write predominately horror, though I cut my teeth on fanfiction(dot)net with Naruto song fic and fantasy short stories with wild west mechas and bird-footed villains. No, I will not tell you how to find it.

I went to undergrad for Creative Writing and Literature and left with that plus a minor in philosophy (because I apparently hated myself). My grad degree is an MFA in English Lit with a concentration in Gothic Lit (surprised? No? Oh.). I wrote two papers on Dracula: one on homoerotic subtext, one on the Madonna/Whore complex of Lucy.  I think I liked school. My writing from the time implied that I did not.

I do not know what these entries will become. Maybe reviews of books, movies, and shows. Maybe updates on current writing projects. Maybe rambling (probably rambling). Whatever it becomes, I hope you will sit beside me in the void as I call out. Maybe you’ll even call out, too.

Cheers,

Jen