About Me
Write-from-home novelist and composer;
choir director; disability rights activist—
why yes, in fact I do have my hands full!
Author and liturgical composer Kathleen M. Basi is mother to three active boys (read that: always breaking something) and one chromosomally-gifted daughter. A proud native of flyover country and an honest-to-goodness farm girl (as in cattle, hogs, chickens, grain bins and a combine), she spent her childhood climbing trees, jumping off hay bales and chasing cattle back into their pasture when they broke through fences. (But she never once tipped a cow.)
Road trips are familiar territory for her, as she took several 3-week RV trips with her grandparents. She saw more national parks in her first 10 years than many people see in their entire childhood, and she loves exploring new places. (Especially the food.)
Her degrees are in flute performance, and she has been involved in music for Catholic worship since she was ten years old. She’s been writing stories even longer than that. (School bus. First grade. Orphan Annie fanfic.) She believes the written word and the sung note should make the world a better place. That doesn’t mean pretending ugliness doesn’t exist. The world is messy, and pretending otherwise just makes it harder for everyone. She aspires to acknowledges the reality of the world while pointing toward what makes it most beautiful.
Her nonfiction has appeared in a number of magazines, Chicken Soup for the Soul and on NPR’s All Things Considered. Her fiction is represented by Sonali Chanchani and Claudia Cross, and her novel, A SONG FOR THE ROAD, is available wherever books are sold.
Contact her by email, or follow on Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Goodreads, Twitter, and her monthly newsletter.
Selected awards/recognitions:
Winner, WFWA Rising Star Award 2016
Winner, Song of the Year 2022, Association of Catholic Publishers, for “Come All You Thirsty“
3rd Place, WFWA Rising Star Award 2014
Finalist, WOW Fall 2013 flash fiction contest
Finalist, 2011 Glass Woman Prize, for “The Third Day,” Apeiron Review, Issue 5, p. 12
Winner, Best Regular Column – Spiritual Life, Catholic Press Association 2012, for “Just Live It”
2nd place, Catholic Press Association’s “Best Essay in a Professional & Special Interest Magazine,” 2012, for “Full Immersion Baptism,” in Family Foundations, Vol. 38, no. 1, July-August 2011
Finalist, 2019 Association of Catholic Publishers “Excellence In Publishing Awards,” for song “Show Us Your Face.”
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