Sonja’s writing has been honored with a NYFA Fellowship, an Iowa Review Award, Pushcart Prize nomination, and grants from Vermont Studio Center and The Deming Fund for Women. Her work has appeared in some of the country's finest literary journals, including the Iowa Review, Alaska Quarterly Review, Southeast Review, AGNI, the Spoon River Poetry Review, BREVITY, Gulf Coast, and is anthologized in several texts on writing, including SHORT TAKES, THE TRUTH OF THE MATTER, and THE CURIOUS WRITER. Sonja holds an MFA from the University of New Orleans and an M.S. Ed. from SUNY Brockport. She runs writing workshops locally, provides manuscript consultations, and teaches in UCLA Extension's Writing Program.

Sonja's first book, GHOSTBREAD, won an AWP Book Prize for Nonfiction.

Besides writing, Sonja enjoys snapping photos, hiking in bogs, and is currently hooked on English murder mysteries. She was born and raised in western New York State, where she now lives with her two overweight tabbies and her husband, the artist Jim Mott.