Carrie S. Masek has been telling stories since she was three and discovered she got into less trouble when she provided creative explanations for the chaos that swirled around her. It took her almost forty years to start writing her stories down. Carrie now lives in a comfortably messy house on Chicago's North Shore. Contributing to the chaos are her husband, four children, a ditzy dog and an opinionated house rabbit.

Carrie has written two award-winning novels, UNDER A BEAR MOON (Hard Shell Word Factory, 1999), winner of both the 2000 EPPIE for Young Adult fiction and the 2000 Dream Realm Award, children's category, and ROOM FOR LOVE (Treble Heart Books, 2002), winner of the 2002 Lories Award for Best Overall short contemporary romance. Her short stories have appeared in romance genre publications and web sites. "Cybergeist" is her first venture into horror. She wrote the story to exorcise a nightmare.

You can usually find Carrie working at her desk, but if her chair's empty, check the vegetable garden -- she likes to dig in the dirt. Carrie also enjoys long bike rides, oatmeal stout cake, and belly dancing.