Solomon James

I spent several years as an olive oil specialist at Zingerman's, which is exactly as specific and wonderful as it sounds. I learned to taste the difference between a Spanish arbequina and a Sicilian nocellara, to explain why a forty-dollar bottle earned its keep, and to teach: diving deep into a topic so I can help someone else feel its value. That turns out to be the job I've been doing ever since. Just with different subjects.

These days I write from home in the Ann Arbor/Ypsilanti area, where I'm also the stay-at-home parent for two teenagers I homeschooled for a dozen years. The gap between I understand this and I can make you feel why it matters is most of the work, and unschooling parented me right into the middle of it.

I use a wheelchair (spinal fusion surgeries, long story, boring outcome) and I work entirely remote. That turned out to be a good match with my deepening work in AI.

The horror obsession is real and has been for a long time. I'm drawn to horror in all of its subgenres. The dread lives in the subtext and the implication. That aesthetic runs through everything I make, even the work that isn't horror. It shows up as care about what's left unsaid, attention to tone, a preference for the sentence that slightly unsettles over the one that comfortably explains.

The AI workflow work grew out of the same instinct: I wanted to understand what these tools actually do to a writer's voice — whether they expand it, flatten it, or something stranger. So I started building systems to find out. Now I help writers and creative professionals use those tools without losing what makes their work theirs.

If any of this sounds like a fit, I'd love to hear from you.