Combining a passion for the arts, people, and community involvement, Lizzy Sellers studies writing and psychology at Florida State University. For those of you who haven’t had the pleasure to meet her, she descends from a family that instills the importance of learning, service, and multiculturalism not only in their children, but also in their surrounding community as well. Lizzy’s father, a retired test pilot in the US Air Force, works as a content developer for Polyhedron Learning Media, a company specializing in the construction of physics labs and accompanying educational programs for high schools and colleges. From an early age, her parents encouraged her to explore a variety of wide interests. Her inclinations know no bounds. Whether deconstructing the working parts of a novel, diving around Florida with her leadership position in the Scuba Club at school, or traveling around the US to ski down North Carolina’s Appalachian slopes or venturing out to the East Coast to camp in the sand, Lizzy does so with a voracious, open mind.
Before coming aboard Weelunk, she has worked in an editing position at Study Breaks Magazine where she oversaw and delegated materials to many writers on a weekly basis, and also, as a published fiction writer for The Kudzu Review, Florida State University’s undergraduate literary publication. Originally, she set her eyes on Florida with an interest in marine biology, but while taking English courses, she discovered her true love for writing and publishing. But when recounting the past, this discovery reveals itself to be something that’s always been inherent within her all along. She remembers a childhood saturated with reading. “I just always read. My mom almost had to stop me from buying books. I was reading too quickly for the space at home we had, so she bought me the first model of the Kindle and I read as many E-books as I could,” she chuckles. Along with her avid reading from a young age, Lizzy accompanies her three other siblings with playing both classical and jazz music under the initial guidance of her father. She exudes friendliness and the desire to experience new things, but don’t you dare mistake this for naivete. Her work reveals a mastery for examining the persistence of humanity in dire, bleak situations. “Last Resort”, her published short fiction piece in The Kudzu Review, demonstrates her writing prowess, and is absolutely worth a read. Two people, driven to the depths of despair, are forced to sit face to face in an enclosed corridor with two revolvers. To win means to be awarded an ungodly amount of cash, while to lose is self explanatory. In one of the darkest situations imaginable, Lizzy somehow pierces a single ray of warmth and goodness into a room that would otherwise be enveloped in a crushing nihilism.
Growing up, Lizzy took full advantage of school programs such as Advanced Placement classes and performing arts. “Wheeling is a great place to raise kids,” she sums up her high school reminiscing before confessing that she found herself bored as hell during the long summers. However, she views the area differently now upon reentering from Florida after a spell. “Tallahassee can be a cold place, but here I see an active community where people really come together,” Lizzy begins as she lists the amount of revitalization that she was surprised to see after returning home from college. Wheeling is in fact consistently becoming a haven for young, creative people. Lizzy plans on taking her skills and experiences to a New York publishing house someday while still claiming Wheeling as her home.