Sally Crosiar (rhymes with ‘closure’) thrives on making stuff up! "I thought my writing focus would be self-help," she says, "Until the fiction bug bit deep. Suddenly the voices in my head had a purpose!" She describes herself as a 'pantser' when writing, focusing first on characters (those voices in her head) and then letting them spin out their stories. "I like making trouble for my characters. And they seem to like giving me pesky problems to solve. It's an introvert's version of fun - to play with people in one's head and not have to put on mascara and earrings to engage!"
Her most recent novel HOME PLACE is a story of sibling inheritance and conflict. HOME PLACE is set on the farm and hundred-fifty-year-old house where Sally grew up. "My family had to move from there when I was fourteen," she says. "And that left me with lots of feelings about the place - and a desire to re-write history. Of the place, not me." The question, Sally says, was whether Kat Patterson could manage to save her ancestral home as Sally's family could not. "I made up Kat - who's way more interesting than me - and all the other characters. Except Stupid-Odd the cow. She was real, so real I couldn't leave her out."
Sally's rural roots show too in her debut novel, COME BACK. "There's more drama in small towns than you might expect," she says. In COME BACK you'll see Sally's signature first-person multiple-points-of-view style. "The characters poke around in my head. Isn't it a fair turn-around to poke about in theirs?" She's especially drawn to themes of healing after trauma and how that happens - or doesn't. In COME BACK, most bystanders only see Vi Masters' polish until a reluctant visit to her hometown uncovers secrets and unforeseen consequences that forever alter the lives of four narrators.
Though fairly new to fiction, Sally is no stranger to writing. Shortly after losing her first husband, she published FIND THE LOVE OF YOUR LIFE to share how she and Dave found each other. “We’d both been hurt, both nearly ready to give up on love. And then we both gave it one more shot. Lucky, lucky us!” That last shot at love involved a strategy Sally had never tried before. “I stopped looking for the perfect guy – and instead set a really clear goal for a relationship. Three weeks later, I met Dave who lost his sight eleven years before we met! But in my goal, I never said my partner had to be able to see! My goal kept me honest and pushed me to have the guts to give love with Dave a try. Thank all the stars I did!”
Writing about Dave and the love story he and Sally created helped her heal after his death. “We started the book before Dave died,” says Sally. “Finishing our story helped keep Dave with me – and eventually helped me see that with him, I’d learned too much about loving not to use what I learned. Eventually, I brushed off my goal and used it as my Match.com profile.” It took a little longer than three weeks the second time. “I started looking before I was really ready, is what I think,” Sally says. “But after so much grief, I did need to have fun again. And I was surprised to find that dating could be fun! Maybe I wasn’t old enough before.” Was she lucky to find love again? "More work than luck," she says. "But yes! Ray and I have been together for almost twenty years and the essential components of my goal? We've got those!"
Sally's other books include MY UNCLE DAVE, a children’s book with an adult message. “It’s an almost true story about when Dave, the blind guy falls into the swimming pool. And not just once. Twice in a week’s time! No kidding.” In the story and in life, Sally and Dave both learned that it’s not what happens to us, it’s how we react that makes all the difference. What Sally most likes are Ted Williams’ illustrations that bring MY UNCLE DAVE to life. “Ted captured my Dave wonderfully. When I look at some of the pictures, I can almost hear Dave cackle!”
In 2002, Sally teamed up with Dr. Sidney B. Simon of Values Clarification and Realization fame to co-author LOVE BUILDERS: TOOLS TO BUILD ANY RELATIONSHIP, filled with simple ways to share appreciation and love to the people who matter most.
She has also co-authored numerous health and youth development curricula as a consultant for Cornell University, including Choose Health: Food, Fun, and Fitness (2015), Choose Health in 4-H Clubs (2012), Youth Development Foundations for 4-H Camp Staff (2003), Growing Healthy Girls (2002), and more.
Sally lives in the Finger Lakes region of upstate New York where she loves playing in, on, and near the water, creating wearable art, savoring fine red wines from sunnier climes, and reading, reading, reading. In addition to writing, she teaches adults how to influence kids' health, play, and learning.
