Deborah J. Lightfoot   Author and Editor 

"It's a long lane that has no turning. None of us is likely to end this journey unchanged from what we were when we began it." (Excerpt from Waterspell Book 2: The Wysard) 

Castles in the cornfield provided the setting for Deborah J. Lightfoot's earliest flights of fancy. On her father's farm in Texas, she grew up reading tales of adventure and reenacting them behind ramparts of sun-drenched grain. She left the farm to earn a degree in journalism and write award-winning books of history and biography. High on her bucket list was the desire to try her hand at the genre she most admired. The result is Waterspell, a complex, intricately detailed fantasy comprising the original four-book series (Warlock, Wysard, Wisewoman, Witch). In the "Nina sequels" to that earlier quartet — The Karenina Chronicles and The Fires of Farsinchia — new generations of powerful wysards carry the saga into the magical future of an ancient world. Having discovered the Waterspell universe, the author finds it difficult to leave. Even her newest book, the dystopian standalone Adverse Reactions, may be tangentially linked to the wysards' world. But that's for readers to decide.

Deborah is a professional member of the Authors Guild. She still lives in rural Texas. Find her on Instagram @booksofwaterspell and on Goodreads.

 In the course of a 45-year career, I have had to come up with numerous author bios of varying lengths and emphases. After a while, the exercise becomes tedious. To spare myself, I've collected bios for all occasions here in one place, so I can copy and paste as needed. A saver of time and trouble.

Deborah J. Lightfoot, a native of West Texas, got her love of history from her grandfather, a High Plains cowboy. From her mother, an artist and avid reader, came her love of books and all things mysterious and magical. Dark horsemen entered her imagination through such early influences as the television show Have Gun Will Travel, in which Richard Boone's Paladin was "a knight without armor in a savage land." Small matter that the sophisticated Paladin wielded a six-shooter instead of a sword.

Six-shooters figure in Lightfoot's award-winning books of Western history and biography, The LH7 Ranch and Trail Fever. Swords and sorcery provide the action in her epic fantasy series Waterspell, a six-book saga with medieval overtones and historical background. Adverse Reactions, a Western/paranormal/fantasy blend, brings together her various interests in a mashup of post-apocalyptic, dystopian, speculative fiction. With a journalism degree summa cum laude from Texas A&M University, Lightfoot has worked on both sides of the editorial desk for periodical and book publishers. A long-time member of the Authors Guild, she has taught creative writing at the college level and won numerous writing awards.

Deborah J. Lightfoot got attached to history through her grandfather, a High Plains cowboy. From her mother, an artist and avid reader, came her love of books and all things mysterious and magical. Deborah has had a fondness for dark horsemen since Richard Boone's Paladin rode through TV landscapes wielding a six-shooter instead of a sword. Six-shooters figure in her award-winning books about the American Southwest: Trail Fever (William Morrow) and The LH7 Ranch (University of North Texas Press). Swords and sorcery provide the thrills in Waterspell, her six-book epic fantasy series. A journalism graduate and an Authors Guild member, she has freelanced in educational publishing. Besides writing, editing, and devouring books, Deborah's pleasures include traveling abroad and hiking the Yorkshire moors, Canada's Pacific Rim National Park, and while living in Mexico part-time, that country's La Primavera Bosque.

Castles in the cornfield provided the setting for Deborah J. Lightfoot's earliest flights of fancy. On her father's farm in Texas, she grew up reading tales of adventure and reenacting them behind ramparts of sun-drenched grain. She left the farm to earn a degree in journalism and write award-winning books of history and biography. High on her bucket list was the desire to try her hand at the genre she most admired. The result is Waterspell, a multi-layered, intricately detailed fantasy about a girl and the wizard who suspects her of being so dangerous to his world, he believes he'll have to kill her … which troubles him, since he's fallen in love with her. Deborah is a professional member of The Authors Guild. She still lives in rural Texas.

Deborah J. Lightfoot, a native of West Texas, got her love of history from her grandfather, a High Plains cowboy, and her love of books from her mother, an artist and avid reader. Lightfoot's books include Western history, epic fantasy, and the dystopian "weird Western," Adverse Reactions.

Deborah J. Lightfoot writes epic fantasy and speculative fiction. A native of West Texas, she's the granddaughter of a High Plains cowboy, and her childhood was steeped in books, history, and the great outdoors: character-molding experiences that factor into all of her writing.

Texas-based author Deborah J. Lightfoot writes across genres, with notable works including the Waterspell fantasy series and the post-apocalyptic dystopian Adverse Reactions. A former journalist and a longtime member of The Authors Guild, her portfolio spans epic fantasy, paranormal suspense, and historical nonfiction. Explore her novels at deborahjlightfoot.com.

Deborah J. Lightfoot (known to some readers as Deborah Lightfoot Sizemore and to others as D.J. Lightfoot) was born on the South Plains of Texas, the daughter of a farmer and the granddaughter of a cowboy. Her grandmother is on the honor roll of Texas quilters. An agricultural journalism graduate, summa cum laude, of Texas A&M University, she is the author of three books and many articles about the American Southwest. Her first book, The LH7 Ranch (University of North Texas Press), was a finalist for the C.L. Sonnichsen Book Award and won a San Antonio Conservation Society publication award, as did her second book, Trail Fever (Wm. Morrow, New York), published under the name D.J. Lightfoot for readers 9 and up. With the late Simon W. Freese, P.E., she coauthored A Century In the Works (TAMU Press), which received the History and Heritage Award from the Texas Section of the American Society of Civil Engineers. An Anglophile, she has focused on British medieval history and Celtic folklore for her new fantasy series, Waterspell, published under her Lightfoot byline. In manuscript and since publication, Waterspell has won awards in several contests.

Additional Background for the Curious:

Deborah grew up writing, reading everybody from Tolkien to Kjelgaard to Orwell and Andre Norton, studying nature on the farm and playing clarinet in the school band. Her band letter-sweater, a prized keepsake, displays a National Honor Society pin with her solo-and-ensemble contest ribbons, and academic medals in English and History alongside one for Algebra: proof that writers can do math.

At Texas A&M she switched majors from Wildlife Science to Agricultural Journalism upon realizing that a bachelor of science in journalism would support any kind of words-work she might ever want to do.

There have been many kinds. The author of three award-winning volumes of history and biography, she's a former newspaper copyeditor and reporter, a magazine editor and feature writer, a teacher and a speaker, for many years a science writer, educational writer, and book manuscript editor ... and with the Waterspell books, a novelist and fantasist. Thus she may claim not to have held a real job for twenty years.

Besides writing, editing, reading, photography, and launching her own publishing venture, her pleasures include traveling abroad and hiking the Yorkshire moors, Vancouver Island's Pacific Rim National Park, and Jalisco's La Primavera Bosque. From 1997 until 2005 she stretched a pinchpenny decorating budget between two houses: a two-story in Texas that she and her husband, Gene Sizemore, built from scratch, and a red-tile-roof masonry casa that they acquired on impulse while vacationing in Mexico.