Kathleen Parrish lives and writes in Arizona on a two-acre horse property in the Sonoran Desert, right up against the White Tank Mountains. These days she’s a wife, mother, writer, and gleefully retired nuclear engineer, but she got there by deciding to become an astronaut at the tender age of eleven. She blames it on the Apollo Space Program, which filled her head with visions of working for NASA and going to the moon. Books by Robert Heinlein, Arthur C. Clark, and Isaac Asimov on the library shelves of her elementary school library in Fort Knox, Kentucky may have contributed.
That decision led her to the nuclear engineering program at Kansas State University, and a career in nuclear engineering. She never made it to the moon, but somewhere along the way, she caught the writing bug, for which there is no cure. She also fell in love with a practical man who wasn’t afraid of brainy girls, got married, had two sons, and wrote on the side for fun and therapy. Her engineering career eventually brought the family to Arizona and the Palo Verde Nuclear Generating Station, about 60 miles west of downtown Phoenix, Arizona.
Kathleen planned to retire early from her career in nuclear engineering and write amazing stories of science fiction, fantasy, and contemporary thrillers. Instead, in 2010 she received a hefty cardboard box from her mother containing a massive, type-written manuscript by her late uncle, Herman Willis Logan. The story had been written back in the 60s and was set in 1938 Mississippi. Mom asked her to revise it, per her uncle’s request, and to try and get it published on behalf of the family. In many ways, Second Son is her uncle’s story, and the story of her family. Kathleen is now working on a sequel, Southern Woman, set in the 1950s, which continues the story of the Whitaker family in the next chapter of their lives.
KC, Thanks for all your help in the writing group. ~ Henry
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