Born in Louisville and raised in the bluegrass state, poet and short-story writer Tia Kessler has always called the Commonwealth home and sees no reason to change. Coming from a long line of poets, musicians, and coal-mining mountain men, as her father says, “She gets it proper.” Currently Ms. Kessler resides in south central Kentucky with her two children and Sebastian, the family cat, in the tiny cottage they’ve dubbed Raven Hill Haus.

The Reader/Writer

Family legend has it that Kessler was born reading. By age 9, she’d begun her first attempts at creative writing. Within the following year, Tia had consumed many literary classics, favoring in particular Hemingway, Poe, and Shakespeare, and by age 12, she had discovered (and devoured) such modern writers as Jack Kerouac and Hunter S. Thompson.

Though she seems to be constantly working on one or another writing project, music and art are passions as well and always dear to her heart. Kessler also finds time for hiking and camping and admits to a particular weakness for whiskey.

The Writing

Ms. Kessler’s first collection of poems was published in 2013 as La Petite Mort, and her newest work, Girl Unbound, Volume 1: In Love, was released on Valentine’s Day 2014 by Cook Creative Works.

WARP Place is reprinting Kessler’s short-story “Karminrot,” from the current issue of the online magazine the-were-traveler. Ms. Kessler has also shared some of her poetry with us, both from her earlier collection, La Petite Morte, and from her soon-to-be published Girl Unbound, Volume 1: In Love.