Instead of telling the mentors why they should pick me, I've decided to share some of my influences, or early reading loves, when I tore into books and didn't stop until it was finished. (Note: some of my loves are cheesy, so this may not bode well for me, but err, here we go!)
My mother loves to say that I just picked up a book and started reading. Out of the blue, she didn't encourage it or anything, besides subscribing to the weekly kid's book club. My mom, while well-meaning, wasn't the "read a book" before bedtime kind of mother. Once I could read, she gave me all the time in the world to help myself, and did I ever.
My first serious book loves were R.L.'s Stine "Fear Street" series, "Sweet Valley High" (at one point I had a goal of reading all of them, but alas I never met it), and Lois Duncan.
In the 9th grade, thanks to a grocery store display stand, I got into V.C. Andrews. The book was "Dawn", which I gobbled up, thus launching my true love with twisty, windy family saga type books that I could not get enough of. I finished the rest of this series, and went backwards, reading the "Heaven" series next, before finally landing on the crazy family in "Flowers in the Attic." I got my best friend, who was leery of reading, into the books too, and got her all hyped up to read more. So yay! My first librarian-like effort! 
V.C. Andrews was one of the first authors I felt a kinship towards; because her name was Virginia, like me, and also like me, she lived in my same state--Virginia. It didn't feel so strange being that nerdy, bookworm with the matchy name to her own state.
In high school, at my lunch table, I passed around copies of my own family saga book that involved fraternal twin girls (undoubtedly inspired by Sweet Valley High, although Jessica and Elizabeth were identical, couldn't rip them off completely.) My lunch table devoured my series, and raved about all the crazy family drama, and I was so content, floating to school on cloud nine. Instead of spending extra time on homework, I would chug away at an old-school laptop (very clunky, small screen) using Word Perfect to create what I thought were epic masterpieces. I was high on the power of my words making an impact. I was eighteen, thought the writing world was my oyster, and hastily sent out a ton of queries for the first book in the series and promptly got a zillion rejections and one full request, which obviously, thankfully, turned out to be a no.
In college, things slowed down in writing as I fell into another universe: online gaming. I played Everquest, met my future husband--he was a rogue, I was a wizard, (match made in RPG heaven!) And continued to
game instead of write. When I did write, it was fun, spin-off stories of secondary characters from my high school series.
Nowadays, I write for myself (most importantly), but also try to write books that might appeal to others as well. This year alone, thanks to entering contests with my women's fic, and being a member of writing communites like AQConnect, I've picked up CPs, query know-how's, and just in general, a better sense of where I want my writing to go.
And totally, unrelated, but here are some hot hot hotties that I just felt like posting about. My TV loves! I loved the show the "Tudors" and Jonathan Rhys Meyers was a big part of why. And I've been following "Supernatural" since Season One, and squealed when I saw Dean from "Gilmore Girls" on it, playing a hunk named Sammy Winchester.
