Photo credit: Randye Sundel
Photo credit: Gabi Coatsworth
Photo credit: Ryan Garesio
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Lisa Bernard is an accidental, encore-career essayist who began writing to share her outdoor adventures. Believing she retired, she headed to northwestern Connecticut to ride and do right by her elderly horse, Dolce. Within months, she was a local columnist on equestrian matters and chronicling the antics of neighboring black bears on her blog. The musings of this city kid turned 60-something wildlife whisperer, were enchanting readers from the Bronx, USA to Brisbane, Australia. Lisa’s articles and missives caught the eye of seasoned writers and editors in Fairfield County as she participated in meetups and mics at The Westport Library starting mid-2023. Four of her blog-based, literary and nature nonfiction essays have since won CT Press Club Awards, and she serves with honor as a member and judge in 2024 and 2025. The embrace of her scribe tribe gave Lisa courage to write about a darker time, the loss of her young husband to cancer. Her caregiving, widow’s and parenting journeys inform her reflections on grief, ageing and reinvention with four such compositions published traditionally in 2025 in the Freshwater Literary Journal and by Carpe Vitam Press and Woodhall Press. One piece of realistic fiction introduces the protagonist in her WIP, Insignificant Others. This debut novel is a twisting tale of romance, second chances and renewed identity for divorced and widowed women amid the early maelstrom of online dating, ubiquitous Smartphones and the emerging scourge of pernicious pornography. Lisa always worked and now writes in the context of her life. Expecting her first grandchild, she’s toying with turning bear and barn capers into a children’s book. Still a Russia wonk and watcher from her Cold War career, she’s brainstorming an espionage thriller. The Russian Bear … grey-beard dating … Connecticut’s black bears … this Boomer’s keyboard barely rests. Other Publications:
Freshwater Literary Journal, “Andrea’s Coda” Grief Like Yours, “The Permanence of Ink Across Life and Death” and “Remembering My Horse, Dolce” 2025 CT Literary Anthology, “Stage IV: Early Mourning” CT Press Club Awards - gold, silver and bronze blog posts: Far More Than a Bookstore: Howard’s at 25 Main Street – Lisa Bernard’s Essays to Elevate & Enlighten The Interlude: A New Year & Welcome For Winter’s Gift of Negative Space – Lisa Bernard’s Essays to Elevate & Enlighten It’s December & How Fondly I Remember the First Little Bear With Whom I Shared a Winter Four Years Ago – Lisa Bernard’s Essays to Elevate & Enlighten Tu B’Shevat or Not! Never a Question for Me, Because I was Raised to Celebrate the Trees – Lisa Bernard’s Essays to Elevate & Enlighten |
Interview with Lisa Bernard
about her story "Shivering"
Honorable Mention for The Scribes Prize
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What inspired this piece?
“Shivering” was inspired by my gratitude for the counselors who shepherded me through my late husband’s ill-fated dragon war with metastatic colon cancer. We were young, 33 and 34 years of age, with two kids under five. The controversies surrounding his experimental treatments, the invisible rigors of acute caregiving and the push to keep the kids’ lives “normal,” would have overwhelmed me were it not for my therapist and the on-call counselors at the American Cancer Society. They helped me “keep my Teflon on” when facing displaced anger from his parents, and to remain functional amid broader family dysfunction and the indifference of obtuse people in our community and at work. My writing seeks to bring invisible struggles into the light and into perspective, paying forward what psych professionals did for my young family in crisis. That our children grew up to be fine people (they’re now older than my late husband and I were during the unfolding tragedy) is a credit to those devoted psychologists and social workers.
What draws you to the micro-fiction genre?
I’m drawn to micro-scribing by two magnets. One is the magic of fractals. Like in geometry, fine micro-scribing contains its essence in its tiniest observable form. That is groovy. The other lure is the skill-building that micro-scribing facilitates. Paring down numbers of words to build pithier, more memorable messages is divine editing for muggles.
Who are some authors that inspire you?
Marinating in my WIP and reflections that inspired “Shivering” ... Mary Higgins Clark and Faye Kellerman hold special pockets in my heart for their consistent features of young, determined, sincere and talented widows. When I lost my husband at age 34, there were few relatable role models but for the 30-something heroines conjured by Mary Higgins Clark, and Rina Decker, the recurring protagonist in Faye Kellerman’s mysteries. These characters felt like big sisters from other misters, demonstrating how to navigate the social dislocation and gear-grinding journey of grief young widows endure. Both authors’ mysteries also mirror an overlooked reality: that regular life goes on. Bereft children must be raised. Careers need recalibrating. Dating is tricky—and sticky in the context of broader family dynamics. If I could do for my readers what these authors did for me...
As an old Soviet/Russian Studies major and analyst in my first career, I adored the required reading on love in Russia’s imperial period - from Tolstoy through the revolution with Pasternak! In my downtime, I devoured the espionage of John LaCarre, Tom Clancy and Nelson DeMille. I still reread their classics for an international intrigue fix.
Currently, I’m on a Lisa Jewell binge. Her thrillers offer a wide angle lens with fly-on-the-wall details of emerging social, relationship, psychological and tech trends. With excuses for none and sensitivity for all, she peers into the caverns of contemporary digital life and portrays their sobering dynamics. Her novels are pageturners—and pausers, as I call them—the reveals are so jarring and resonant that I have to put the book down and reflect. She’s a British author, and when I brought her realistic fiction to the attention of my online book club with tens of thousands of American readers, few knew of her. I’m all the more grateful that my reading buddy discovered her novels in the Bookcycle parked by Compo Beach in Westport and shared them with me.
“Shivering” was inspired by my gratitude for the counselors who shepherded me through my late husband’s ill-fated dragon war with metastatic colon cancer. We were young, 33 and 34 years of age, with two kids under five. The controversies surrounding his experimental treatments, the invisible rigors of acute caregiving and the push to keep the kids’ lives “normal,” would have overwhelmed me were it not for my therapist and the on-call counselors at the American Cancer Society. They helped me “keep my Teflon on” when facing displaced anger from his parents, and to remain functional amid broader family dysfunction and the indifference of obtuse people in our community and at work. My writing seeks to bring invisible struggles into the light and into perspective, paying forward what psych professionals did for my young family in crisis. That our children grew up to be fine people (they’re now older than my late husband and I were during the unfolding tragedy) is a credit to those devoted psychologists and social workers.
What draws you to the micro-fiction genre?
I’m drawn to micro-scribing by two magnets. One is the magic of fractals. Like in geometry, fine micro-scribing contains its essence in its tiniest observable form. That is groovy. The other lure is the skill-building that micro-scribing facilitates. Paring down numbers of words to build pithier, more memorable messages is divine editing for muggles.
Who are some authors that inspire you?
Marinating in my WIP and reflections that inspired “Shivering” ... Mary Higgins Clark and Faye Kellerman hold special pockets in my heart for their consistent features of young, determined, sincere and talented widows. When I lost my husband at age 34, there were few relatable role models but for the 30-something heroines conjured by Mary Higgins Clark, and Rina Decker, the recurring protagonist in Faye Kellerman’s mysteries. These characters felt like big sisters from other misters, demonstrating how to navigate the social dislocation and gear-grinding journey of grief young widows endure. Both authors’ mysteries also mirror an overlooked reality: that regular life goes on. Bereft children must be raised. Careers need recalibrating. Dating is tricky—and sticky in the context of broader family dynamics. If I could do for my readers what these authors did for me...
As an old Soviet/Russian Studies major and analyst in my first career, I adored the required reading on love in Russia’s imperial period - from Tolstoy through the revolution with Pasternak! In my downtime, I devoured the espionage of John LaCarre, Tom Clancy and Nelson DeMille. I still reread their classics for an international intrigue fix.
Currently, I’m on a Lisa Jewell binge. Her thrillers offer a wide angle lens with fly-on-the-wall details of emerging social, relationship, psychological and tech trends. With excuses for none and sensitivity for all, she peers into the caverns of contemporary digital life and portrays their sobering dynamics. Her novels are pageturners—and pausers, as I call them—the reveals are so jarring and resonant that I have to put the book down and reflect. She’s a British author, and when I brought her realistic fiction to the attention of my online book club with tens of thousands of American readers, few knew of her. I’m all the more grateful that my reading buddy discovered her novels in the Bookcycle parked by Compo Beach in Westport and shared them with me.