By Jamie Kelly, Bulletin editor
In some ways, Ally Russell has been preparing for a career as a writer since she was a little girl.
Russell, a Garfield native who now lives in Boston, said she wrote her first short story when she was 8 or 9 years old.
The story was fan fiction — an unauthorized sequel to a book in the Goosebumps horror series.
Her lifelong love of horror merged with both her love of writing and her experience with children’s literature.
Russell spent time as the lead children’s bookseller at the Settler’s Ridge Barnes and Noble bookstore and that helped convince her that was the audience she wanted to write for.
“I went and I got my MFA in writing for children from Simmons University,” she said. “And so I just knew that I wanted to focus on middle-grade fiction, just because those are some of my coziest reading memories.”
Russell’s newest book — her second — is “Mystery James Digs Her Own Grave,” a middle-grade horror novel.
Middle-grade books are aimed at readers between the ages of 8 and 13 or so. Russell said her book is aimed toward the older end of that segment, say ages 10 to 13.
The book draws inspiration from Russell’s love of cemeteries, something she’s learned about herself since moving to New England, as well as by the story of the Highgate vampire, a British tabloid sensation in the 1970s where people claimed a vampire was stalking one of London’s cemeteries.
“And I was like, oh, there really isn’t a lot of representation in this space for black and brown girls, of course,” she said. “Now the new “Wednesday” show has come out with Jenna Ortega in the role Wednesday. And that was, you know, pretty exciting for me to see. So I just wanted to try to contribute to this space.”
Russell actually has a connection with the Netflix hit “Wednesday,” as well, as she was hired to write a companion to the series.
“The way I described it to my editor, it was the best homework assignment I’ve ever had,” she said. “I feel like I trained my whole life for that particular homework assignment.”
She got her love of horror from her father, Bernard Russell, who still lives in Garfield. He said he introduced her to classic horror movies like “The Invisible Man,” as well as author Stephen King.
Ally Russell will be in Pittsburgh for a book launch event, the first one she’s holding in Pittsburgh. The event is at 6 p.m. Sept. 26 at Stories Like Me, 4381 Murray Ave.