Brenda Marie Smith

At 67-years-old, Brenda Marie Smith is finally having the writing career she's longed for all her life. Her second novel (and the first to be published by someone besides herself), IF DARKNESS TAKES US, won the 2018 Southern Fried Karma Novel Contest and was published by SFK Press in October 2019. The book is post-apocalyptic science fiction, unique in that it features an aging grandmother, Bea Crenshaw, and it takes place in a slightly altered version of the author's own neighborhood.

Now Brenda's sequel, IF THE LIGHT ESCAPES, will be published in August 2021, again by SFK Press. The story's told in the voice of Bea's 18-year-old grandson, Keno Simms, a stalwart young man who must lead his broken family and neighbors to survive life without electricity, cars, phones, or running water.

IF DARKNESS TAKES US is a true-to-life apocalyptic tale. It portrays a grandmother and her four grandkids struggling to survive after a solar electromagnetic pulse takes out the entire U.S. grid and vehicles with internal computers. No running water, telephones, or doctors to boot. But Grandma has secrets that could help them survive.

Brenda studied fiction in the UCLA Writers Program. She self-published her first novel, Something Radiates, after raising the funds via crowd-funding. A sequel to If Darkness Takes Us called If the Light Should Come is under consideration by the publisher. The story is written in the point of view of Bea’s 18-year-old grandson, Keno. More books in the series are in the works.

Brenda has lived in Austin, Texas for thirty-nine years. Prior to that she was a member of The Farm (a vegan hippie commune based in Tennessee, where she studied spiritual phenomena and her sons were delivered by midwives, including the famed Ina May Gaskin).

In Austin, she helped to found Soy Foods of Texas (maker of tofu salads still available today), the Austin Peace and Justice Coalition, Mockingbird Productions (a concert promotion company), and Green Earth Oil Distributors (a supplier of biodegradable motor oil). She was General Manager of the Inter-Cooperative Council (student housing co-ops near UT) for fifteen years, and she does bookkeeping, business writing, and income taxes today.

Brenda and her husband own a solar-powered home in South Austin and have more grown kids and grandkids than they can count.