Laulie Powell

As an idealistic law school graduate, I thought I would never leave my dream job as a Public Defender. But after five years - disillusioned with the sheer number of guilty clients and beat down by the demanding workload - I saw a job listing in my law school's newsletter which simply said, "The Marine Corps is looking for a few good lawyers." I called the contact number, beginning my twenty year adventure in the United States Marine Corps. When I retired in 2008, I self-published a fictionalized memoir, Embrace and Flow, about the extraordinary experience I had while stationed at Marine Corps Central Command during the time period of the Iraq War. It was a form of catharsis, helping me move on with my life after the stroke I suffered in 2005. I found that even though the stroke has affected my ability to speak, it hadn't affected my ability to write. A few years later, I self-published Color By Number, a novel about three Marine Corps lawyers, one destined to become the lawyer to the Commandant of the Marine Corps. Then in 2015, I started researching the story of VMB-612, the Marine Corps' B-25 PBJ Night Bombing Squadron of WWII, the squadron in which my father had been a pilot. Called The Flight Jacket, it was published in 2019 by Hellgate Press. Creating the characters to tell this story was an amazing experience. It opened my eyes to what my father had experienced, giving me a better understanding of him, and the men of his generation. In 2020, I revisited a manuscript I had written years before, called Behind the Curtain about life at Marine Corps Barracks, Washington, D.C. Never having heard of "8th and I," the publisher of The Flight Jacket was interested, publishing it in 2021. Several years ago, I moved to Melrose, Florida, the place at the heart of my family's life when I was a girl. I am currently working on the next book, called Life after 50.