About the Broads

Ellen Seaton

Ellen SeatonEllen Seaton grew up in Memphis, Tennessee during the ’60s and ’70s until she graduated from college, jumped into her car and hit the road. Just like Davy Crockett so many years earlier, she told her friends and family that they could all go to hell, but she was going to Texas. It was a smart move.

After relocating she was employed by a national corporation for funeral services and then a traditional oil company. Not loving the corporate life, Ellen went back to school and collected a couple of graduate degrees in Communications and Social Work. She worked her way up to being a Social Services Administrator before retiring to live the wild life.

While balancing out her administrative duties, Ellen became a writer, artist and all around liberal and feminist. Mother to a couple of geriatric “old broad” cats, Ellen is pleased to have evolved into the Crazy Cat lady who lives on the corner.

Travel is great fun for this senior as long as it is done by car. Ellen. Does. Not. Fly. Ever. As an Earth Goddess in training, planes just fly too high, nothing’s beneath you and there is never a string to hold you up.

Now as a retired Social Worker, Ellen has become a full-time writer in several genres including science fiction fantasy, history and historical fiction. She continues to call Texas home.

View Ellen’s posts.

Fern Brady

Fern BradyFern Brady is the founder and CEO of Inklings Publishing. She holds multiple masters degrees and several certifications. She began her professional life as a foreign correspondent, taught for 15 years in Alief ISD, and is a full-time realtor in Houston. She has published numerous short stories, two children’s picture books, and a couple of poems. Her debut novel, United Vidden, which is book one in her Thyrein’s Galactic Wall Series, released in 2020 along with her graphic novel/novella hybrid New Beginning. She is the current president of the Houston Writers Guild, with whom she served in that capacity previously, and is on the board of Authorology. Besides being Municipal Liaison for Nanowrimo Houston, she is also a member of American Book Publishers Association as well as of Blood Over Texas and Romance Writers of America. She lives in Houston, Texas, with her parents and her talkative husky, Arya. Follow Fern’s writing at: www.fernbrady.com.

Contact Fern by e‑mail.

View Fern’s posts.

Rachel Connelly

Rachel Connelly head shotRachel Connelly is a freelance developmental editor, born and raised in Houston, Texas. For as long as she can remember, writing and reading and storytelling have been her passions. As an editor, it brings her so much joy to help others bring life to the stories inside their heads.

Rachel loves to write about anything weird and silly, and she loves to combine laughter with a heartfelt message. Although she has a penchant for the spooky and creepy as well. Her dream is to one day write for a sitcom or limited TV series, as well as publish books for young adults that make them feel seen.

Outside of her work as a writer and editor, Rachel is a local community theatre actress, avid painter and crocheter, and mom to four ridiculous cats. She loves to learn about spirituality, psychology, and the human experience.

In everything she does, Rachel hopes to make people smile.

View Rachel’s posts.


Melanie Ormand, Emeritus

Melanie Ormand head shotA childhood spent under the blue skies and green grasses of the Texas Panhandle fed Melanie and her lifelong lust for the open road. Family vacations nurtured her vagabond spirit. Thank summertime forays across Texas, New Mexico, Colorado, and California.

She left her Pampa hometown for a distant college. Four years and a diploma later, Melanie departed Austin for broadcast jobs and bigger media markets, settling in Houston. Later, Melanie and her husband traveled the world as crisis communications consultants. The best part of rescuing messed-up companies? Travel. Sometimes exotic, even extreme.

Melanie tallied her road trips: she’s overnighted in all 50 states (Puerto Rico makes 51?), plus 24 foreign countries. Her Travel Bucket List includes spend-overs on all seven continents. She’s 4/7th the way to that goal.

With the family business sold, Melanie’s beckoned once again to the road. As often as she can escape. How matters less than what.

This blog came to life, courtesy Ellen, a writer friend, who prefers road travel to soaring skyward. She suggested driving to a Colorado-based writing retreat in June, 2018. Melanie answered with two words, one of which can be repeated in any company.

Melanie will gladly share full details of her life mission, shortened to this sound bite: to write healing stories for a world in pain.

Such stories come from many kinds of road trips. You’ll hear some of them here.

Join us, won’t you?

View Melanie’s posts.