About Mary

Mary Oldham is an award winning author, and three-time Golden Heart Finalist with the Romance Writers of America in the areas of Contemporary Romance and Romantic Suspense. Mary lives in Portland, Oregon when she is not sitting on her deck and looking at the Pacific in Yachats, Oregon, the Gem of the Oregon Coast.

How did Mary get into writing?

One day in 2008, she was at the beach with her parents who have since passed. She mentioned she thought she could write a book. They looked at her as if she were crazy. A few months later, she finaled in the first contest she entered, The Maggies. It was the only conference her mother was able to attend with her and the passion for writing was ignited.

How  was the name for the publishing house, By-Creek-Ity chosen? Mary's grandfather and great-grandfather built a beach house south of Yachats for one of Mary's great aunts. It was called Sea Hills. They built a bunk house behind Sea Hills that ran by the creek that was called By-Creek-Ity. The creek has always been pronounced Crick. The house had been sold by the time Mary was born, but there were many fond stories of Sea Hills and By-Creek-Ity as she grew up.

Why Self-Publishing? 

After two agents and twenty-eight years in digital sales something had to change. "Being a salesperson, it was very hard not to see the needle move for me. In March 2012, when my mother died, she said, "Never stop writing." I didn't and as a consequence, I had almost fifteen completed manuscripts when I decided to self-publish. When my father died in January 2021, I got to thinking, "You have a dream and life is short." I quit my sales job a month later. I quickly got my Real Estate license to help an old friend as his assistant, but on a long drive to Yellowstone a few months later, I decided to hire an editor and get a second opinion about my writing. In October 2021, I published my first book, The Silver Linings Wedding Dress Auction." I quit the real estate position in December 2021 to focus full time on the writing.