Heidi Skarie

When I was a child, books were an important part of my life and I enjoyed being read to. My parents captured my imagination and fueled my love for books with stories like Princess and Curdie and At the Back of the North Wind by George MacDonald.In college, I studied visual arts and started keeping a journal.My interest in writing novels came about in an unusual way after I married and had three children. One night I had a dream that was like watching an action-packed science fiction movie. The dream story continued over the next two nights. At the time, my children were young and it was difficult for me to find time to write down my dreams. Fortunately, it was a three-day weekend and my husband, Jim, could watch our young children while I wrote down my dream each morning.Jim went to work for the next four days and I didn’t have any more dreams, but the following weekend was another three-day holiday and I dreamed the second half of the story. The dreams took up ninety pages in my journal. It was a great story and inspired me to become a novelist.After writing a science fiction novel based on the dream-story, I began to write more books about the same characters and their continuing adventures in a war-torn universe. In 2014, I published the first novel in this series, Star Rider on the Razor’s Edge, and am currently working on the fifth book in the series.My interest in other cultures and places inspired me to branch out into historical fiction and I have two published novels in that genre. Red Willow’s Quest is about the adventures of Red Willow, a young Native American woman, who is studying to become a medicine woman in 1807. Annoure and the Dragon Ships is a well-researched saga that takes the reader from one of the first Viking raids on Saxon England to the steppes of Asia.I also have pieces in four anthologies: Where the Rivers Converge: Prose and Poetry of Carver County Writers; Conscious Women Conscious Relationships: True Stories of Wisdom & Awareness on the Path of Relationships; Romancing the Lakes of Minnesota, Valentine’s Day; and You Can Never Go Wrong By Being Kind. Currently, I’m a member of the Speculative Fiction Writers Group, Carver County Writers group and a critique group. I also write a blog and teach a writing class.I live with my husband, Jim, and my cat, Lucky, in Minnetonka, a suburb of Minneapolis. My three wonderful children are grown and I’m the proud grandmother of three young grandsons.Like Red Willow I’ve learned to follow my heart and dreams. As a result, I’ve been rewarded many times over as I share my novels with the world.Readers can contact Heidi by email at [email protected], or friend her on Facebook, Twitter or Google plus.