There’s a world of fantasy in stories emanating from Elgin County, and it centres on a busy mother whose creativity has turned her into a one-person industry.

Kelley Armstrong is an international and New York Times bestselling author, whose Women of the Otherworld series has made her a favourite of the paranormal genre.  She has published 10 novels in that series, as well as the young adult trilogy Darkest Powers, a crime series, and several serial novellas and short stories collections.

Armstrong’s novels No Humans Involved and The Awakening have been New York Times bestsellers.  Her latest anthology, Tales of the Otherworld, was published in April and can be previewed on her website, www.kelleyarmstrong.com. 

The dark, suspenseful and dangerous world that Armstrong’s characters inhabit is created in a sunny and peaceful house in Malahide Township between Aylmer and Tillsonburg.

The house sits on a farm-sized property of 12 acres but “we don’t farm anything except kids and pets,” Armstrong says.

She and her husband and three children have settled into a daily weekday routine.  Once the other family members are off to work and school, Armstrong settles down to the job of creating the two books she is contracted to produce each year for HarperCollins publishers.

“My surroundings are an inspiration in the sense that I have purposely picked a very nice, quiet place here,” Armstrong says. “We have a great location and I am still less than two hours from Toronto so I can easily commute and attend business events.”

Born in 1968 in Sudbury, Armstrong obtained a degree in psychology and then turned to computer programming before returning to her first love, writing.  She sold a novel called Bitten in 1999 – two years after she moved to Malahide from St. Thomas – and it was published in 2001.  The next year she became a full-time writer.

Armstrong’s quiet routine is frequently broken by travel commitments but she says that travel from Elgin County is not difficult because of the proximity of the London and Toronto airports.

“The vast majority of full-time writers and artists that I know of prefer some place like this,” Armstrong says.  “You are reasonably close to a major centre for transportation and business reasons but you are in an attractive quiet area with full services.

“This is a very good area to raise children,” she adds.  “Our kids are going to great schools.  They’re happy.”

Armstrong gets involved in the community by donating her time to visit area schools and libraries by invitation several times a year.  She is donating the proceeds from her two Otherworld anthologies to World Literacy of Canada.