My name is Lara Zielinsky. I write adult fiction featuring women-loving women characters. Most of these characters are bisexual cisgender women like me. I have lived in Orlando, Florida, where I set NONE of my stories, since 1989. I grew up in north Florida, after my family moved there in 1979, but left as soon as was feasible. I was born in Trenton, New Jersey, but have very few memories there other than snowy days, spring cicadas, and a honeysuckle bush at a neighbor’s house. I have more memories of Boston and the surrounding communities, in Massachusetts, where my grandparents lived, and where I spent my 16th summer, visiting again in 2010 for Provincetown’s Women’s Week.
I have been writing since 1998, and have, to date, five published novels. But I began with writing fanfiction. I wrote more than 250 stories across several fandoms, including Xena: Warrior Princess, Star Trek: Voyager, Boston Public, Guiding Light, Swingtown, and Once Upon a Time (under the penname: LZClotho). I dip my toes back in from time to time, particularly STV and OUAT. Follow me on AO3 to be alerted when I post something new.
In 2001, I turned to writing original stories. My first publication credits were short stories in anthologies. I finally drafted my first novel in 2001. It would take me five years to rewrite, revise, and refine, and find a publisher. In 2007, a small lesbian press, PD Publishing Inc., published the first edition of Turning Point, a celebrity late in life coming out romance. Turning Point was a finalist for Debut Author at the Golden Crown Literary Society’s Goldie Awards (best in sapphic fiction) and a fan favorite in several lesbian fiction online awards. In 2010, PD Publishing published the sequel, Turn for Home, which met with critical acclaim.
When PD Publishing folded in 2012, I recovered the rights to my work and found a new publisher, Supposed Crimes LLC. In 2013, second editions of Turning Point and Turn for Home were published, and for the first time, the stories became available as ebooks.
Life lifed, and I returned to the comfort of established worlds in fanfiction as I worked as a public school teacher. In 2018, my writing tilted in a new direction. We Three: One and One and One Makes Three was published in 2019. Then, the sequel, We Fit: We Three Together, was published in 2022. I also stopped teaching in 2020, turning for income to the editing that I had been doing more and more, and establishing a DBA: LZ Edits.
On the tenth anniversary (2023) of the second edition of Turning Point, Supposed Crimes helped me release a dual volume, Turning Together, which contains both Turning Point and Turn for Home within the same hardcover. Also in 2023, Supposed Crimes published Turning In: More Stories of Brenna and Cassidy, short stories that follow the characters past the end of the novels into their new life together.
I am still writing. For the latest on my works in progress, including me reading audio excerpts, sign up to my newsletter on Substack.
~ Lara
Lara Zielinsky 