Paula Sophia

Paula Sophia retired from the Oklahoma City Police Department after twenty-two years of service in May 2014. She was the agency's first openly transgender police officer. She is also a graduate from the MFA in Creative Writing program at the University of Central Oklahoma where she studied the art of fiction writing. Her work has appeared in various online and print publications including: The Molotov Cocktail, The Bicycle Review, The Red Fez, and The Cynic Online.

Recently, she published a short story "Hystericus" with Etopia Press, which is available for download at Amazon.com and other e-readers.

Also, catch her novel, "Shadowboxer," released by Etopia Press in December 2011. "Shadowboxer" explores closeted identities, the consequences of bullying, and the explosive release of a suppressed personal truth.

Etopia Press published her first short story collection "Dirty Laundry" in January 2015. Dirty Laundry explores the unraveling of lives at their most intimate moments, the uncomfortable starkness of truth, the unmasking of lies. Whether a cop on the make, a seminary student, or a college kid trying to stay pure, nobody avoids the soil of circumstance. Some try to hide from themselves, others embrace who they truly are. But nobody gets away clean.

Forthcoming will be her first foray into genre fiction, a piece she's calling "Graveyards" about a female cop who meets a vampire while working undercover in a strip bar.

In addition to writing fiction, Paula has been a columnist with the Red Dirt Report, Gayly Oklahoman, a contributor to Our Big Gayborhood, and a slam poet competing on the national stage at the National Poetry Slam. Recently, Paula has been teaching English Composition and World Mythology at Rose State College and Oklahoma City Community College. When not writing or teaching, Paula can be found searching for Zen on the back roads of Oklahoma, finding balance on her motorcycle.