Quick Biography

Marilyn Brandt Smith blossomed amid the blue bonnets and mesquites in south Texas. Her heroes are her parents who taught school, coached basketball, ran a ranch in their spare time, and most of all, believed in her.

She reached for the educational hoops that qualified her to teach, counsel, and direct rehabilitation programs from Texas to the nation’s capital and out to the Rockies. There was a stint with the Peace Corps in the Dominican Republic, and a summer exploring Europe along the way. Blindness threatened some road blocks, but her determination and resourcefulness won out.

Her Texas roots now flourish in Kentucky soil. She’s part of a large extended family, and has opened her hundred-year-old home to critters as small as pinky mice, bred for the large boas and pythons her family bred and sold for a decade. Social networking and conferencing as well as old-fashioned letter writing and taping keep her in touch with fellow writers and friends she’s known since she was six.

Marilyn has written and edited for small-niche publications since college. She points with editorial pride to “Behind Our Eyes: Stories, Poems, and Essays by Writers with Disabilities” (published 2007) and Magnets and Ladders, an online magazine which showcases strong, creative literary work.

Lavender, leather, roses, and cedar make her smile. Water exercises and soaks keep her strong and sane. Family favorites like chicken and dumplings and peach cobbler will one day find themselves in a published collection of her specialties.

Marilyn reads and writes about what makes her curious: drama that doesn’t play out as expected; history that seems to have changed people’s lives overnight; future technology or tragedy from all perspectives; and the storms and strategies in the lives of people who need a leg up on life.

Her book, “Chasing the Green Sun,” is a collection of plots, realities, and rhythms in a calendar format. Human interest, surprise endings, and thought provokers abound.