Kimberly Raiser

Where to begin...well...it all began on the top of a sliding board, at an elementary school, in the county of Bucks in Pennsylvania when I sat wondrously atop of that shiny metal slide, at eight years old, thinking...."Right now, at this very moment, I am the only human being sitting in this exact space, in this town, on this planet, in the entire universe."

I digress...though that is a true story.

I began writing at a young age, mostly poetry and creative stories. I did always have a great love of Science Fiction. My mother and I would spend Saturday afternoons watching "Dr. Shock's Creature Feature Double Feature" out of Philadelphia. I was 10 when that tradition started. And of course "Star Trek" reruns!

When visiting my grandparents in Pennington, New Jersey, my grandfather would watch scary movies on the weekends and I would be glued to that big console tube tv as well. Space 1999, UFO, "The Screaming Skull". As a teenager he would take us to the movies to see such greats as "Invasion of the Body Snatchers"and "The Philadelphia Experiment". Which by the way, he worked at the facility where that story originated. He was an electrical engineer and let me tell you, he said that experiment really happened!

As my love of Sci-Fi grew I began writing stories on road trips, in front of the television, and so forth. It wasn't until 2006 that I seriously considered getting anything published. I found this wonderful Speculative Fiction webzine called "Silverthought" that I submitted my first ACCEPTED piece of fiction: "Stranded on Infinity". In 2008 that became the title of my first anthology of short stories that had been published over the previous two years.

I did forget to mention that my poetry was first published in 1995 and continued for years in magazines and anthologies, though it was always very personal to me and wasn't until now that I gathered a collection of those pieces to put into print. I am thrilled to have this available to share with others: finally. "Thistle & Thorn" has pieces inspired by William Shakespeare, Edgar Allan Poe, and just the pure whimsical side of my nature.

Some of these pieces were written in times of revelation, some in pain, but most out of wonder, and love.

I will be continuing my pursuit to finish "Children of Roen" which is an urban fantasy about the cursed descendants of the Lost Colony of Roanoke.

Trivia: I did receive a query letter from Dreamworks Inc back in 2008 about movie rights to "The Family Bones". Although nothing came of it...that was FUN!!!!

Trivia" "A Pound of Flesh" which is a horror short, placed #1 in Kindle Horror Sales in 2013. I was searching for something to read in horror at 1am in the morning whilst in bed and there it was at #1!!!! I woke my husband up, took a screenshot, and savored that moment....for ever!!!!!