I grew up in Massachusetts in a house filled with books and cats. Perhaps this is why so many of my earliest works of fiction featured cats (talking cats, magic cats, cats who transformed into people, etc.). Too bad cat fiction isn’t really a genre.

For as long as I can remember I’ve kept journals and notebooks with bits of poems and story kernels. I won a few essay contests in middle school. I worked on my college’s newspaper all four years. I blogged while studying abroad in England. But still, I never pictured myself as a professional writer.

Getting my MFA was the best thing I could have done for my writing career. Not only did I get to work with some amazing writers, but it taught me the discipline needed to have a long-term writing career. My MFA program also taught me how to take criticism from peers and how to navigate the business side of writing and getting published. If you have the opportunity to pursue your MFA, or take a class, a writing workshop, or join a critique group, I highly recommend it.

Writing can be a pretty thankless job, but I do it because I love to live inside other people (which sounds creepier and stickier than it is). I like to invent new worlds, or reimagine the past.

Sign up for my newsletter to read more about my current writing projects, favorite authors, and special behind-the-screen content.

Official Bio

Sarah Parke holds an MFA in Popular Fiction from the University of Southern Maine’s Stonecoast MFA program. She has been published in The Writer and Speculative City, and her fiction plays with alternate historic timelines and magical circumstances. Earlier in her own timeline, she spent six years helping authors polish their prose as an acquiring editor at a regional trade publisher. She currently works at Wesleyan University where she writes stories about the campus community for the magazine and newsletter. She is also the social media coordinator for Rogue Owl Press. A New England native, Sarah lives in Connecticut with her husband, Sean and their menagerie of spoiled indoor cats and rabbits.