I was born Grace Janet Leih in Canton, South Dakota, in 1936, attended Prairie View Country School in Lincoln County, and graduated from Washington High School in Sioux Falls in 1954.  After graduation, I worked briefly locally, then joined the U. S. Navy.  I was married in Memphis, Tennessee in 1955 and left the service in 1956.  I have three children born between 1956 and 1960, Ruth Anne (Rose) Shepherd, Pamela Meder and John Jeffords.  I was separated from my ex-husband in 1964 and divorced in 1968.  During this time I was a student at Memphis State University in Memphis, Tennessee, where I received my BA in German and Math in 1967 and did two years of graduate work until 1969.  I also wrote a great deal of poetry.
     In 1969 I went to Europe where I lived in Würzburg and Munich, Germany for one year each.  I wrote two novels during this period, Parts I and II of the trilogy, Valley of Many Winds, titled Shouting to the Wind and Which Way the Wind Blows.  I was also able to travel extensively in Germany, the Netherlands, England, Belgium, France, Switzerland, Luxembourg, Italy and Austria.
     I moved to San Francisco in 1971 and worked as a computer programmer/analyst and consultant for a number of corporations.  I wrote very little between 1971 and 1977.
     In 1977 I returned to the Sioux Falls, South Dakota area.  I became involved in work for the South Dakota State Poetry Society, which culminated in my being elected president in 1985 and 1986.  I was the 1982 South Dakota State Poetry Society "Poet of the Year".  I was editor of the South Dakota Authors' Catalog in 1982, 1983, 1985 and 1987.  I was project director of the project to bind sixty years of Pasque Petals for donation to the Library of Congress, which took place on February 24, 1987.  I was on the Pasque Petals staff in 1983-1984.  I was also project director and managing editor of A Sixty Year Comprehensive Index of Pasque Petals (1926 - 1986) which was published in October, 1987.
     Since returning to South Dakota, I published my trilogy, Valley of Many Winds,  Which Way the Wind Blows, in 1978, Shouting to the Wind in 1996, and The Windmill in 1996 under the pseudonym "Mario Edlosi".  Under the pseudonym Helen Forelle I wrote a pro-choice abortion rights pamphlet titled Conversations in a Clinic and published it in 1980; wrote a children's story titled The Adventures of Mortimer Troll and published it in 1981; wrote a third novel, which is the third part of the trilogy Valley of Many Winds, titled The Windmill, in 1982; wrote a musical comedy between 1981 and 1985 titled The Tea-totalers; collected and published another pro-choice abortion rights book, If Men Got Pregnant, Abortion Would Be a Sacrament, in 1982. Pearls Among the Swine is a collection of my poems that I published in 1990, another collection of poems, A Classical Garden, was published in 1996, and a third, Under the Gun, was published in 1997.  In ad