She is the author of Song in the Silence, The Lesser Kindred, and Redeeming the Lost, the initial trilogy of a series based upon humans re-establishing contact with dragons, who fled mortal lands thousands of years ago.
[1] An American by birth, she moved to Scotland in 1976 to attend the University of St. Andrews.
Her day jobs have included being apprenticed to a variety of folk (mostly in Hilo) — a gold-smith, a book binder, and a short career as an assistant furniture and artwork restorer.
In 1995 she moved back to her beloved Edinburgh, since which time she has spent 6 years, on and off, as a copy-editor on Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, a cutting-edge astronomy journal.
In 2002 she married Dr Steven Beard, continuing the astronomy connection.