Number 10.
I was once hired by a major airline to try to smuggle a fake bomb onto a plane. Thankfully, the employees found it -- and they caught me too!
Number 9.
Most of my schooling was in French. It helped me
get a lot of jobs, including the one I have now. (One of
the courses I teach is French.)
Number 8.
I moved to New York in August of 2001 and started
teaching one week before September 11th.
Number 7.
I have felt the presence of a ghost several times
in my life.
Number 6.
My ears have been ringing since I was 21. Literally.
I used to go to clubs all the time. One night, when I came
out of a club, my ears were ringing, and they have never
stopped. I rarely venture out to concerts or clubs, but
when I do, I have to wear earplugs, because my hearing is
now hyper-sensitive. (If you go somewhere really loud, wear
earplugs!)
Number 5.
I was once hired as a power tool demonstrator.
I was the only female, and I didn't know what the hell I
was doing.
Number 4.
I am a minister's daughter. My mom is
the minister.
Number 3.
I spent my 24th birthday alone. It was a few weeks
after I moved to New York and I didn't have any friends
yet. I decided to live out a secret fantasy: I bought a
cream pie and stuck my face in it. (And yes, I ate it afterward!)
Number 2.
I write while listening to music. I often do an
upper-body dance in my chair and nod my head. Sometimes
I get up, do a little dance, then sit back down again.
Number 1.
I have probably only finished half of the books
I've started. If it doesn't grab me within twenty pages,
I stop reading it.
Born in 1977, Allison grew up in Canada's
capital city, Ottawa. It's a beautiful city with lots of
historic landmarks, parks, and cute guys in baseball caps.
In her pre-teen years, Allison was a voracious reader, and
it wasn't long before she started writing stories of her
own. At fourteen, she wrote her first full-length novel.
In high school, she began writing mini-romances
featuring her friends and their favorite celebrities. The
stories became popular and classmates started paying her
to write them. After several months, Allison decided to
stop taking orders in order to focus on her own fiction.
Allison attended Carleton University in
the English program, but quickly switched to History, because
she found most of the books she was supposed to read boring,
and the task of analyzing them even more boring. She excelled
in History, and spent the last year of her undergraduate
degree at the University of Edinburgh in Scotland, though
she admits that a good deal of that time was spent in pubs
and coffeehouses and cheesy dance clubs.
Allison is an optimistic person despite
the fact that trouble seems to follow her wherever she goes.
In Scotland, she was an extra on the set of the film House
of Mirth when her dress caught fire and she had to STOP,
DROP and ROLL. (At least it earned her special treatment
on the set along with the nickname FIREBALL.) Always charitable,
Allison volunteered at a distress center taking phone calls
from troubled youth, only to be kicked out for refusing
to lie to callers about their conversations being recorded.
Her pursuit of trouble didn't end there.
After finishing teacher's college she decided to find the
most pleasant, serene place to begin her teaching career:
Brooklyn, New York. She taught at Sheepshead Bay High School
for 3.5 years and managed to survive riots, death threats
and assaults (if being pelted with coffee constitutes an
assault), while still being a well-liked teacher called
V Dep.
While teaching in Brooklyn, she began writing
teen fiction. She wanted to write the sort of gritty story
that would appeal to her students. Three years later, Street
Pharm was sold to Simon and Schuster.
Since then, Allison has returned to Canada.
She teaches at an alternative high school, and continues
to write novels for teens.
