Official version: Madeline Claire Franklin is a 2018 graduate of the Vermont College of Fine Arts MFA program in Writing for Children and Young Adults (VCFA WCYA). When she is not writing strange fiction for young adults, she is probably dismantling the patriarchy and/or practicing witchcraft. She lives in Buffalo, NY, with her dog and three cats, in a little yellow house called Cluckleberry Farms, which, as yet, has not actually yielded any crops.
Long version: I was born (two weeks late) in Buffalo, New York during the exciting time in American history known as “The 80s.” It was the decade that gave us such blessings as the Goblin King, the moonwalk, and the unfortunately not-well-thought-out hypercolor clothing, among other wonders. I actually don’t remember much of it, and most of what I think I remember usually ends up being from “The Early 90s.”
Despite the fact that my parents met while in a religious cult, my childhood and family life were pretty normal and uneventful I think, at least in terms of what some other people consider normal. I had a nuclear family and attended public school. But my mother is also a doctor of holistic medicine (which means I haven’t used fluoridated toothpaste since 1995), and my father owns an organic lawn care company (which means when other kids were writing essays on recycling during Outdoor Education Week, I was writing about the horrifying effects of pesticides and herbicides on squirrels.)
I spent most of my youth wearing funny hats in my attic bedroom while scribbling down vaguely plagiaristic novels of truly epic proportions, but also hanging out with my besties in the woods hoping to discover a dead body. One time, at a Halloween party/sleepover, my friends and I experienced a genuine mass hallucination after using a Ouija board to contact the ghost of my late hamster. In later years we partook in 2 A.M. roadside (or center) tea parties instead of contacting the spirit world.
All in all, I think I turned out pretty all right.
In undergrad, I studied Cultural Anthropology for 2 years at the University at Buffalo before switching majors to Media Study and Production, where I embraced my love of unconventional storytelling methods. I also adopted two cats, brothers from the same litter, named Luke and Leto (who you will see pictures of quite frequently on my instagram). After graduating from UB I got another cat, go married, bought a house, got a dog, got a divorce, kept the house and the dog and all three cats, and eventually went back to school for my first and truest love: creative writing.
In July of 2018 I graduated from the Vermont College of Fine Arts Writing for Children and Young Adults program (VCFA WCYA) with an MFA in creative writing. It was the proudest moment of my life, and I don’t know if I’ll ever be done beaming about it.
