Sue McGarry is a woman who likes to be seen and heard. Originally from Canada, she decided to escape the land of ice and snow and move to San Francisco to further her career as a software (UX) designer. That was 1995. A lot has changed since then! But she continues to be inspired by the exciting, baffling, and mercurial city that she’s called home for 30 years.

Sue had a fabulous career that began at large corporations like Apple and Yahoo! before progressing to freelance work at small startups and whirlwind design agencies. During those years she also had a child, divorced, recoupled, and discovered what it takes to be a working mother in a male-dominated industry. The highs and lows of that era inspired her recent novel, Badge In Here.

Writing became a real pursuit in 2016. That’s when Sue joined her first critique group and, several months later, read a selection from her unfinished novel at Lit Crawl SF. Her short story Step on a Crack was a Finalist for Dialogue in the 2018 CRAFT Elements Contest. That same year she shelved an unfinished novel and started a new one during NaNoWriMo. A second Lit Crawl reading happened in 2019, this time an excerpt from her new story, Badge In Here. Fast forward to 2025, and in between rock climbing, traveling, and eating well, she has finally finished the book.

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