I write gothic horror set in real places, and I live in Lisbon—a long way from the law firm desk in the United States where this whole story began. This platform is for writers who believe the world is the best research a story can have. Whether you’re on a plane or dreaming of one, you’re exactly where you need to be.
The path here wasn’t straight. It was long, a little chaotic, and involved at least one canceled flight at the worst possible moment.
It started with a fledgling novelist sneaking glances at her phone between work projects, dreaming of far-off places she couldn’t quite reach, quietly rediscovering an old dream from high school: writing. By 2018, I was taking it seriously again. Projects that will never see the light of day. You’re welcome.
In late 2019, I booked my first trip to Iceland for September 2020. Then the pandemic happened, and with it the kind of grief that makes writing feel impossible. The only trip I managed that year was helping a family friend move to a new home in St. Louis… not exactly the grand adventure I’d imagined. But even then, standing at the edge of the dark, murky Mississippi River, I caught a flash of something. A glimmer of reflective eyes blinking back at me from the water. A feeling I would later learn to recognize as inspiration. There was nothing nefarious in that river… as far as I could tell.
By 2022, I had a renewed sense of urgency. I finally booked Iceland. No more waiting—it was now or never.
But Iceland was still months away, so I went to Isla Mujeres, Mexico first, partly to hold me over, and partly to prove to myself I could actually do this alone. It was my first solo international trip, and somewhere between the warm weather and unfamiliar streets, the idea for To Be Explored was born. But it was Iceland that changed everything. That trip brought my creativity back to life in a way nothing else had. The landscape didn’t just inspire me. It rewired something.
After Iceland came France, Scotland, Portugal… and eventually, the decision to turn To Be Explored into a full-time venture. It made sense on paper. But beneath it all, something felt flat, like I was maintaining something rather than loving it.
So I took a step back, moved to Lisbon, and let myself think.
It wasn’t until Italy—wandering the streets of Rome before dawn, feeling the weight of a place that has been holding stories since before most countries existed—that everything clicked. Real places make better fiction. The history, the myth, the atmosphere, the way a city smells at 6am. All of it shapes the stories we tell in ways that no desk ever could.
That belief is what To Be Explored is built on now. If any part of this sounds familiar—the blank page, the lost feeling, the sense that the story is out there somewhere waiting for you—this platform was built for you.
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