Alainna Sarver

When asked where she grew up, Alainna Sarver often answers “Everywhere!” With a father in the Air Force, Alainna was almost born in Germany, but ended up being born in Biloxi, Mississippi instead. From there, her family moved to Florida, Texas, and finally, after her father retired from the Air Force when she was ten, to Flushing, Michigan, where her parents still live today. 

Alainna has a love of reading and books that started very early in her life. Her childhood was filled with trips to the library and going to a bookstore was the ultimate shopping trip (and still is!). Some of her favorite books as a child were by authors Beverly Cleary and Judy Blume, along with Little House on the Prairie and Anne of Green Gables. Today, Alainna prefers to read books like Harry Potter, The Hunger Games, and Divergent and is constantly scouring the library and her Nook for the latest in Dystopian fiction. 

She was first introduced to Alma College by a workshop held there for orchestra students. Alainna has played the violin since the age of 10 and had travelled to Alma with her school orchestra for the day. She was greatly impressed by the large fine arts program at the school that allowed students of all majors to participate. Remembering that day she spent there, Alma was one of her first choices when it came to applying for colleges and she was excited to start in the fall of 2000. It was there that she met Elizabeth and Sara, who were members of Sigma Alpha Iota, a women’s music fraternity. Through her fraternity sisters, she also met Joshua. 

Graduating with a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Elementary Education in 2004, Alainna decided to move once again and started her first teaching job in the very rural area of the Eastern Shore of Virginia (think Misty of Chincoteague) in 2005. These days, you can find her introducing a new generation of minds to the love of books and learning in her classroom full of Kindergarteners in the Hampton Roads area of Virginia, where she lives with her fiancé and their sometimes insane cat, Suki. 

When she’s not reading or spending her days with the endless energy of her class, you can find Alainna in the kitchen baking (yummy), outside working in her garden or down the street at the beach. She has recently found a love of photography and loves to take photos anytime she travels somewhere new. You can view some of her photos on Flickr and below: 

She is really looking forward to contributing to this blog and meeting fellow speculative fiction readers!

Follow Alainna: