Just after her sixteenth birthday, Allex Michael submitted her first novel to a large publisher. Unlike most reject letters, her book had actually been read and included some promising comments that encouraged her to keep writing.

Supporting herself with various jobs including waitress, bartender, lifeguard, sales clerk and photographer, Allex kept writing. She also began submitting short stories and articles to various publications. However, she had little success.

Zoology and biology had always come easy to Allex. When her mother taught her to read at the age of two, they read from a massive book on animals. So by the age of four, Allex could identify hundreds of different animal species. Her interest in wildlife and the outdoors continued to grow.

Doing a lot of volunteer work for animals and wilderness areas, she started a small educational journal called Animalwatch. Able to photograph and write, Allex did a lot of the journal herself. Each issue had an article and news summary about a different mammal, bird, reptile, amphibian, fish, invertebrate and habitat. Researching their expertise at the University library, Allex would then cold call the scientist or biologist and interview them. Very few refused. The unique project was soon picked up by libraries and schools around the world. She taught herself how to write html code for a web site and did all the journal page layouts with her own computer. Unfortunately, without advertising revenue, the journal was unable to continue after the third year.

Allex Michael "I was already used to being poor, so that wasn't the problem. Unfortunately, my savings ran out and I could no longer pay the rent. Though it was a great experience, and good for my writing skills, I never made a penny from all the work I did. Plus there was just myself and a couple part time staff, so all I was doing was working night and day and still starving. Though I couldn't make it work, the concept is a good one, and maybe I'll be able to support something like it in the future."

Allex then tried to turn Animalwatch into a weekly television show. As it was going to cost five thousand dollars per episode, just for post production, she was forced to shop around for her own production editing system. Information on the internet was far more limited than it is now, otherwise she could have averted yet another failure. Avid systems were way out of her price range, so a salesman sold her a Telecast system that fit onto a Mac Quadra. The resulting product was not acceptable to broadcasters and money spent for software and hardware was gone.

Writing over two hundred articles on science, animals and the environment, plus a number of short stories, Allex Michael has also published three reference books on animals (with her own photographs) and an illustrated humor book on modern culture (all currently out of print). The animal reference books survived several print runs, but the illustrated humor book never made it past the first printing of one thousand. Allex has written several novels (unpublished), and her colorful paintings attracted a New York Publisher (editor left).

When dreams of becoming the next Stephen King or Michael Crichton never materialized, Allex began writing spec scripts for television and film. This led to even greater disappointments including winning a nondisclosure copyright settlement that was eaten up by legal fees. Given the current lousy conditions for most television and screenwriters, Allex looks back on the experience as extremely valuable. It compelled her to gain more control over her stories by moving up the food chain and becoming a filmmaker.

Bio Part 4.....Career Path