AUTHOR PROFILE
Born in Brazil, Jennifer has also lived in Argentina, Mexico, Costa Rica, and Italy. She's published in several trade journals, including the SOS Climate Supplement for Newsweek and the Brazilian environmental journalism site Oeco.com.br. Her fiction has been published in Cricket Magazine, Sky Island Journal, and other publications. Currently, Jennifer is querying a YA manuscript on deforestation in the Amazon and researching her next YA project on ocean health. She lives in Los Altos with her husband and very large dog.
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Jennifer's work appeared in Pond 88
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Why do you write?
Writing has been quite an evolution for me. I used to write for work. Then it became a personal challenge, and I sought publication in business and environmentally focused journals. And for the last 8 years, it has ultimately become who I am. It is my way of making a difference, whether it’s memorializing an event or a person in words, or parsing weighty topics like deforestation into manageable-sized morsels for middle-graders and teens.
What other creative activities are you involved in?
I’ve played guitar ever since I was eight, and although I love singing, my playing has hardly improved since then. I have dabbled in painting and sketching, but aside from writing, my greatest creative outlet is languages and culture. You need a musical ear to learn languages. And a poet’s heart to feel the meaning of words.
Who is your favorite author and why?
Albert Camus, William Golding (Lord of the Flies) and John Steinbeck. Although I first read these authors in my teens, their work lives with me still.
Tell us about the mechanics of how you write.
Honestly, I’m still experimenting. I tend to write with paper and pencil to get ideas flowing, then edit a little when transcribing on the computer. I always let my words sit for a few days before revising. Oddly enough, I’ve found swimming laps the best time to pinpoint what isn’t working in a text and some possible solutions. It also makes laps add up faster.
Finally, what do you think about Carp, the fish, not our website?
A much-maligned species, known to grow too large and devour plankton and all manner of aquatic vegetation, it also includes its more beautiful counterpart (but no less gluttonous), the koi. We have a small pond in our garden. In it, live five glowing koi and one ridiculously fat goldfish (which is also a carp, by the way). We lost two of our long-standing residents – Ziggy, a luminous white and black speckled creature – and The Red Baron, a burnished bronze fish with a dazzlingly red head, to a visiting heron. Or to raccoons, we’re not sure which.