Author Bio:
With a career built on real-world emergencies, I bring a grounded, authentic voice to historical fiction. For 15 years, I served as a paramedic and EMS educator in California, encountering stories of resilience, tragedy, and hard-lived circumstances. That front-line experience shaped my perspective on the human condition, the quiet ways people endure, and the moments that can leave profound lasting impact.
For over 20 years, I worked at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), partnering with state, local, tribal, and territorial public health agencies. My focus has been emergency preparedness and response, building programs to help communities prepare and respond to public health threats and emergencies.
My family’s history runs deep in early California, stretching back to the 1880s. My second-great-grandmother, Dora Spangler, arrived in Santa Ana around 1885, where her family operated a blacksmith shop serving the growing community. My great-grandfather, Thomas Benjamin Talbert, came to Orange County in 1891. As a pioneer and public servant, he served three terms as Mayor of Huntington Beach and spent 27 years on the Orange County Board of Supervisors. His leadership helped shape the county’s growth, with several landmarks still bearing his name. That legacy of service and perseverance informs my work.
Flossie Colton’s Tragic Smile is where the worlds of humanity, resilience, and legacy intersect. Rooted in fact and told through fiction, it reflects the shadows of the people and places who shaped me.
This photo shows my great-great-grandfather’s real estate office when Huntington Beach was still celery fields and pastureland. Thomas Benjamin Talbert had just sold his driving team, Chappo and Nellie, and upgraded to a Duro automobile, assembled in Los Angeles. That’s likely his eldest son, Gordon, sitting up front. My grandfather wouldn’t be born for another few years. Back then, this wasn’t Huntington Beach yet. It was just scrubland, celery farms, and folks stubborn enough to carve out a living.
That same determination runs through my family. The Town of Talbert (now Fountain Valley) was named after my great-uncle Samuel Talbert, who ran his real estate office from a wood-plank shack long after the paint gave up. They weren’t chasing grand legacies. They were just building a life, one acre at a time.
I tell stories for the same reason. History has a way of getting buried under new roads and fresh paint. My work is about digging it back up — the people, the places, and the choices that never left a mark.
In 1926, Hollywood met Huntington Beach when the most famous silent movie actress in the world, Mary Pickford, joined my great-grandfather Thomas B. Talbert to celebrate the opening of the Pacific Coast Highway from Huntington Beach to Newport Beach. A landmark moment connecting Orange County's past to its future.
The Spangler Blacksmith Shop, Santa Ana, California, 1908. On the right, my great-grandmother Edith Spangler stands with a family horse as a teenager. Beside her is my second-great-grandfather, David Spangler. This shop served the growing town, forging tools, repairing wagons, and shoeing horses for years. Their legacy is part of the foundation that shaped my family's story.