Today we’d like to introduce you to Sierra Larson.
Sierra, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
I have been writing my whole life. I wrote my first book, Sierrachodon, I’m elementary school. It was about a made-up dinosaur, named after me of course. I won a young author’s award and got to attend an award ceremony where I met children’s author Jonathan London. From there, I continued writing. My writing was selected for multiple school publications throughout my school career.
In grade 5, with the support of my parents and teacher, I self-published a book of poetry. A short story I wrote for a city-wide contest made it into the city paper when I was in grade 7. I published my first novel, Red 72, in 2014. My latest novel, Red 72: Revelation, is the fourth and final novel in my Red 72 series.
I’m sure you wouldn’t say it’s been obstacle free, but so far would you say the journey has been a fairly smooth road?
While I always have felt the pull to write, writing is definitely not easy, and there are always people out there who are going to want to rip you off. I thought I had received the offer of a lifetime a few years ago when a publishing house contacted me with a publishing offer for Red 72: Revelation. But it turned out that they wanted to retain the movie rights for the book, meaning any profits from any movies eventually made from my book would go to the publisher, not me. I made the difficult decision to turn down the publishing deal and go a different route.
Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
In addition to writing, I also make comics about woodland creatures, mostly opossums and raccoons. The comics are a loose parody of my own life, and I delve into topics that are hard to talk about – miscarriage, LGBTQ rights, racism, politics, divorce, and so much more.
We’d love to hear what you think about risk-taking.
It’s always a risk to discuss uncomfortable topics in my comics because I’m never sure how my audience will react. The biggest risk I took was making a comic talking about having been admitted to the psychiatric hospital. This comic didn’t get as many views or comments as a typical comic would, but it was an important thing to talk about and destigmatize. Those who comment on the comics about more difficult topics always appreciate my honesty and bravery in tackling these topics, which makes the risk and decrease in views on these comics worth it.
Contact Info:
- Instagram: @worldofpossums
- Twitter: @sierrabarefoot
- Other: https://www.amazon.com/s?i=stripbooks&rh=p_27%3ASierra+Larson&s=relevancerank&text=Sierra+Larson&ref=dp_byline_sr_book_1
