Returning to my science-writing roots

If you’ve been following my writing for the last year and a half, you’ll know that my work has focused primarily on the crossroads of my Catholic Christian faith and nerd/geek culture. I’ve written about superheroes like Captain America, Batman, and Superman. I’ve covered science fiction from Star Wars to Star Trek and even the short stories of Ray Bradbury. I’ve explored themes of faith, forgiveness, human dignity, bioethics and so much more. I’ve had two dozen articles published across five websites, including Bishop Robert Barron’s Word on Fire blog! 

I started writing professionally just before the COVID-19 pandemic forced lockdown conditions in the US. Before this, I was working as an intern in the Biological Anthropology Lab at the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) in New York City. Previously, I had spent six years (2013-2019) as a volunteer fossil preparator and collections assistant in the Division of Paleontology, also at AMNH. Working at a natural history museum has been my dream job since I was a kid. I never grew out of my childhood obsession with dinosaurs and this led me to study fossils and paleoanthropology at Stony Brook University.

While in college, I wavered back and forth about whether I should attend graduate school and get a PhD in paleontology or anthropology. As an alternative, I considered going into science journalism. Several of my professors commented that I showed promise as a writer and urged me to continue to hone my skills in this area. I started a blog called “Deep Time Dispatches” to discuss the latest paleontology news. I wrote a few articles that were well received but, unfortunately, I didn’t keep up with posting regularly and I eventually abandoned the project. 

The last eighteen months have been a challenging but fruitful time in my life. I’m so grateful to all the wonderful people who have helped and supported me in my journey as a freelance writer and editor. I love writing about sci-fi, fantasy, and comic books. You can be sure I’ll continue to produce this kind of content for a long time to come. But I feel the need to get back to my roots, to reconnect with the subjects I’ve been passionate for as long as I can remember. I’ve written a few articles about science in the light of my Catholic faith. One of my personal favorites is the piece for Word on Fire about Nicholas Steno (a saint whose discoveries laid the foundation for modern geology & paleontology). Most recently, I’ve written about the history of astronomy and the Catholic Church. 

The success of these articles has inspired me to get back into science communication (or “scicomm” as it’s often called on social media). I’d like to (A) produce a kind of paleontology/anthropology news roundup and/or (B) review dinosaur books and movies. While I’m primarily a writer, and would love to turn out more articles about various science topics, I’m also interested in branching out into other creative endeavors. 

Recently, I put a poll up on Twitter to gauge if there was interest from my audience in my return to scicomm and, specifically, to ask what kind of platform (blog, podcast, YouTube, Twitch, etc.) my followers would prefer. Although the results of this poll are hardly conclusive (thirteen total responses isn’t a great sample size) it seems that many people favor a YouTube/podcast format for consuming scicomm content. 

Audio and/or video content seems to be the way to go. That’s good because I’ve been itching to start a podcast for many years. I’ve just lacked direction and focus. There are several successful paleontology podcasts out there and I’d need to find a way for mine to stand out from the pack. In any case, this is a long-term project that is in its early infancy stage. As I go forward with this venture I will be sure to post updates about my progress, so be sure to follow this blog for the latest news. I may even start a second website devoted exclusively to my scicomm content. We’ll see. 

Thank you so much for reading my work! I hope that something I have written has informed, entertained, or even inspired you. Big things are in the works for the remainder of this year, as well as for 2022. I look forward to sharing this amazing journey with you.