One of the first stories that senior Lauren Brace wrote featured the adventure of a block of cheese. From there, her love for writing—and words in general—grew. 

Currently, senior Lauren Brace is reading The Dictionary of Lost Words, a novel about the evolving interpretations and varying viewpoints on words. She finds the book fascinating as another example of how everyone can have a different perspective on the same one thing.

Just as so, Lauren also shares her view through her own writing. She especially loves the inevitable creativity involved in writing in her own words, something she read about in The Dictionary of Lost Words.

“I think it’s cool that no matter what, you’ll never have every combination of words,” Lauren said. “You’ll never achieve every combination in the world possible because there’s an infinite amount. Basically, there’s always more words being developed and words changing and their meanings changing.”

With these limitless possibilities, Lauren writes to share her ideas. This mostly comes in the form of the editorials she publishes on The Central Trend. Editorials are opinion-based journalistic stories that allow Lauren to not only express her perspective but also affect others, too, by sharing it.

“I feel like [I’m] getting to change the world in some ways,” said Lauren, describing editorial writing. “Some people have come up to me, and they’re like, ‘Wow, you actually really changed my mind with this.’ I think that’s really powerful if you’re able to get people to see a new perspective—that’s the goal of writing editorials.”

Not only have her stories reached personal levels, but they have also reached wider audiences. Two of her editorials have received Best of SNO distinctions, and another achieved a MIPA award in the Bylined Opinion category. This success came from many years of writing and continued acceptance of feedback that allowed for improvement. 

One of her editorials about history education in primary schools didn’t get approved for publication by the school board at first; nevertheless, she worked to improve the story.

“Somehow, I found the motivation to push myself to kind of rewrite it in a way that I hoped they would approve of,” Lauren said. “Then, we resent it, and they did approve it. Once it was published, it was chosen by SNO and published there. I think that was one of my proudest moments because it was like, ‘Wow, I’m so glad that I rewrote it and that my point was still able to get across and then also shared on other platforms.'”

The publication part of writing gives Lauren a great opportunity to share the writing that she is proud of, which makes her enjoy writing even more.

For instance, in middle school, Lauren wrote a “very cheesy, terrible romance story” and gained a small following of a few girls in her class who avidly read the updates. 

“They would come to me every day [and ask], ‘When’s the next chapter coming out? We are so invested in the story,’” Lauren said. “I think that’s the first time that I really enjoyed sharing my writing, and it was amazing to have that feedback and realize how much your own words can impact other people.”

Because of this love for not just writing but also sharing her writing, Lauren knew from the beginning that she wanted to join The Central Trend staff. She wasn’t able to fit the class into her schedule her first two years of high school because of band and Spanish classes, but she finally managed to find space her junior year and has been on staff since. 

The chance to publish three stories every two weeks allowed her to continue her passion for writing in school, which in turn made her love it even more.

“Ever since that first story was published,” Lauren said, “I just fell in love with writing all over again. It’s been so fun to have my homework be something that I enjoy.”

Lauren isn’t just a writer, either; she’s an avid reader. Many of those who know Lauren also know that she has loved The Lord of The Rings since her dad started reading it to her in fourth grade. In addition to the author of that series, J. R. R. Tolkien, a more recent favorite has been Taylor Jenkins Reid, who wrote The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo and Daisy Jones and the Six, both are books that Lauren finished in two days because they were so enrapturing.

Reading affects Lauren so positively that she also aspires to have a similar impact on others through her writing as her favorite authors did on her.

“[My favorite authors have] written stories that have really impacted me and created something that’s so powerful,” Lauren said. “That’s just so addicting that I want to be able to write like that. I don’t want to write exactly like anyone else, but I want to be able to share stories in the same way that leaves an impact and influences people.”

Writing makes her content, and she hopes for her writing to make others content, too. She plans to pursue a career as a publisher or editor to combine her passions for writing and reading. She will be majoring in English at the University of Michigan. With The Central Trend as a highlight of her high school career, Lauren would also love to continue writing articles or maybe even a book of her own one day.

Until then, Lauren can still be found on weekend mornings with a cup of coffee as she’s writing, completely in her zone.

“I have a little spot on the couch, and then I just start writing,” Lauren said, “and I feel like once I get into it, I start getting really excited as all the ideas are flowing. To other people, I’m just straight-faced, typing on a computer, but in my head, it’s like all coming together.”