“There isn’t anyone you couldn’t love once you’ve heard their story.”

Mary Lou Kownacki

Hello. I’m Hillary.

As a true West Virginian, I maintain the Old Magic by leaving out a pepperoni roll and Mountain Dew for Mothman every June 20th. And speaking of cryptids, Weekly World News once reported they’d found Bat Boy in a cave near my childhood home—though my siblings insist that was just me when I lost my two front teeth.

I served as an LDS missionary in Sweden, where I battled Viking hordes, ate pickled herring and reindeer burgers, and spotted at least one troll. (It may have been disguised as a boulder by daylight, but I wasn’t fooled.)

I live in Sandy, Utah, with my husband Samwise Gamgee. (He prefers “Nate,” but he carries me up my personal Mount Dooms, vanquishes giant spiders, and whips up the most scrumptious taters.) By day, I bake gluten-free treats, transfigure my painfully suburban yard into a wildflower haven, and break up battles between the five feral hobbits who call me “Mom.” By night, I torment imaginary friends until they develop some character and prowl through the seeder parts of text, executing vigilante justice upon crimes against grammar and syntax.

A few of my favorite things:

  • Howls’s Moving Castle — Diana Wynne Jones

    Pride and Prejudice; Persuasion; Northanger Abbey — Jane Austen

    Caraval; Once Upon A Broken Heart Trilogy — Stephanie Garber

    Proper Scandals Series — Esther Hatch

    Matilida — Roald Dahl

    Glamourist Histories Series — Mary Robinette Kowal

    Harry Potter Series — J. K. Rowling

    The Paper Magician Series — Charlie N. Holmberg

    Mistborn Series; Tress of the Emerald Sea — Brandon Sanderson

    Arabella; Frederica; The Corinthian; The Masqueraders — Georgette Heyer

    The Lady’s Not for Burning — Christopher Fry

    Spinning Silver; Uprooted; A Deadly Education — Naomi Novik

    The Lunar Chronicles — Marissa Meyer

    Thursday Next Series; Nursery Crimes Series — Jasper Fforde

    The Wheel of Time Series — Robert Jordan

    Alice In Wonderland — Lewis Carroll

    Sun and Moon, Ice and Snow; Princess of the Midnight Ball — Jessica Day George

    The Chronicles of Narnia Series — C. S. Lewis

    Sorcery of Thorns — Margaret Rogerson

    The Blue Castle — L. M. Montgomery

    East — Edith Pattou

    Bridge to Terabithia — Katherine Patterson

    The Last Unicorn — Peter S. Beagle

    Emily Wilde Series; The Grace of Wild Things — Heather Fawcett

    The Unselected Journals of Emma M. Lion Series — Beth Brower

    Skip Beat! (Manga Series) — Yoshiki Nakamura

  • The Muppet Christmas Carol (movie)

    Avatar: the Last Airbender (TV series)

    The Mummy (movie)

    Lord of the Rings (movie trilogy & stage musical)

    Anastasia (movie & stage musical)

    Galavant (TV series)

    My Fair Lady (movie & stage musical)

    The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe (movie)

    Goblin/Guardian: the Lonely and Great God (K-drama)

    While You Were Sleeping (K-drama)

    Hook (movie)

    Matilda (movie & stage musical)

    Clue (movie)

    Beauty and the Beast (1991 animated movie)

    Tangled (movie)

    Steel Magnolias (movie & stage play)

    Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Among Thieves (movie)

    Austenland (movie)

    Pride and Prejudice (BBC)

    The Lizzie Bennet Diaries (web series)

    Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog (web series)

    Leverage (TV series)

    Wicked (stage musical)

    The Scarlet Pimpernel (stage musical)

    Supernatural (TV series)

  • Matchbox Twenty/Rob Thomas

    Sara Bareilles

    Dear Evan Hansen Soundtrack

    Frozen/Frozen II/Broadway Musical Soundtracks

    The Greatest Showman Soundtrack

    Goo Goo Dolls

    Imagine Dragons

    Taylor Swift

    Jasmine Thompson

    Charlie Pluth

    Christina Perri

    Holly Brook

    Missy Higgins

    Livingston

    The Lord of the Rings Musical Soundtrack

    The Scarlet Pimpernel Broadway Musical Soundtrack

    Anastasia Broadway Musical Soundtrack

  • Writing

    Drawing

    Cooking/Baking

    Home Improvement

    Gardening

    Singing Showtunes

    Occasional Cosplay/Dress Up (a callback to my former life as a theater kid)

    Ballroom/Swing Dance (back when my knees and ankles worked)

    Parenting

  • Papa Murphy’s Stuffed Chicken, Bacon, and Artichoke Pizza with added zucchini, tomatoes, and sausage

    Costco’s Tuxedo Cake

    Mom’s Pepperoni Rolls

    Great-Grandma’s Fried Donuts with Maple and Orange Glaze

    Macaroni Grill’s Rosemary Bread (Not because it’s the best ever, but because we went there on our honeymoon and for our anniversary dinners until we couldn’t.)

    Grilled Cheese Sandwich with Ramen (The cheap stuff I ate every day of summer at MomMom’s house.)

    Mamaw’s Blackberry Cobbler

    Mamaw’s Biscuits with Squirrel Gravy and Homemade Strawberry Jam

    All the deep-fried sushi I can stuff down my gullet until I go into a soy-sauce-and-tobiko-induced coma.

    Gelato teleported straight from some no-name street vendor in Venice.

  • Zutara: The Greatest Ship That Never Sailed

    …And I’m grateful every day for that after seeing how some people on that creative team treated their canon relationships.

    If you know, you know.

  • To move my family out of the city to a 200-year-old farmhouse in the Appalachians with a west-facing library we can paint gold, surrounded by woods where my kids can catch crawdads and salamanders and fireflies every day of summer. We can grow our own food without labels I have to decode. And I can make a comfortable living looking out my window at misty, green mornings while writing about zombie kids whose limbs fall off if they don’t eat their organs every day, girls who live in flying boats and never touch dry earth, and scarecrows terrified by the thought of turning into real boys because humans can’t be restuffed with straw when they break.

Katherine Paterson

“Books allow us to eavesdrop on another person’s soul…

Writers are very private people who run around naked in public.”

My mother never understood how I could spend all day with my nose buried in a book yet still fail to finish my homework. Plot twist: My obsession with books was exactly why the homework never got done.

I’m absolutely obsessed with stories. If you give me the chance, I’ll probably become obsessed with yours, too.

I’m a member of the Editorial Freelancers Association (EFA).

I’m a member of Latter-day Saints in Publishing, Media, & the Arts, and I currently volunteer as Editor-In-Chief of the organization’s Articles Team.

I’m a member of the Society for Editing (ACES).

I’m a member of the Freelance Editors Chapter of the League of Utah Writers, and I currently volunteer as the chapter’s treasurer.

I’ve completed the Proofread Anywhere General Proofreading: Theory and Practice certificate.

My style guide of choice is the Chicago Manual of Style, 18th Edition.

I have over four years of study and practice in grammar, proofreading, editing, literary analysis, and story craft.

I have experience critiquing, proofreading, and editing novels, short stories, memoirs, opinion pieces, and academic works.