Brenda Martin | Spirited Storyteller

Photo courtesy of BrenMar Communications

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Writer, editor, voiceover actor, theatre performer, radio host, children’s book author…Yes, these are all the same person: Brenda Darnley Martin. With such a broad variety of honed skills and talents, it makes answering the question ‘what do you do for a living’ not so simple to answer.
 

“I tell everybody I’m ADD and wake up and wonder what I’m going to be today,” the Michigan native says with a laugh. “It’s real hard to say what I do. I used to think I wanted to call my business Creative, Inc. I figured that was a good way to say I could do whatever.”
 

And in 1989, when she and husband Mike moved to Tampa, she fell in love with the area immediately. “I’d never been here before, but when I got here, I couldn’t stop smiling for the first year I was here I just loved it so much. I’ve always called myself a one-woman chamber of commerce for Tampa Bay,” she says.
 

Her credentials are impressive: BA from St. Mary’s in speech and drama communications, MBA from Notre Dame in marketing and management. She says she had every intention of pursuing her original career goals when she relocated to Florida, but that sometimes what you think you want isn’t what you need. “When I first moved here, I was still under the illusion that I should use my MBA degree, because everyone had urged me to get my MBA saying ‘oh get your MBA, you’ll be able to write your own ticket.’ But nobody told me it was a ticket I wouldn’t want to use,” she says.

Brenda finished overseeing their first house being built and then found herself in the corporate world, a place where she now admits just wasn’t where she was meant to be. For a little over ten years, she served in marketing and administrative roles for the nonprofit organization, Crisis Center of Tampa Bay but her love of theatre compelled her to pursue acting jobs both in local theatre and voiceover work, a big step for someone who’d always dispelled the possibility of pursuing an interest in performance.
 

“I grew up wanting to look like Farrah Fawcett and thought, ‘You can’t do this if you’re not thin and blonde.’ I had always felt like that, and finally I thought, you’re halfway to dead. You’d better start doing what you really want to do,” Brenda says.

She describes her venture into theater as her own “little midlife crisis,” and soon, the speech and drama major who never appeared in a play was taking acting lessons and doing all the things she’d wanted to do. She pursued every opportunity she could to use her skills: voiceover work, TV and radio commercials, reading newspapers for the blind for WUSF, serving as an on-air pledge drive spokesperson for WEDU and appearing in plays with the Carrollwood Players where she also became a board member and publicity coordinator.
 

“Tampa is such a wonderful place for creative people. I feel like I bloomed when I moved here,” she says.
 

She began exploring radio through several weekly programs she would develop with colleagues she had met through her theatre work. Then in 2003, she launched a new local arts-focused radio show “Entertainment and the Arts” on WTAN 1340 AM with then partners Rich Aront and Ginny Fraebel, and it soon became a voice for Bay area visual artists, theatre performers and directors authors and musicians to share new of their latest creations. Nearly seven years later, Brenda continues to host the show which air live on Monday nights from 7-8pm with current co-host John Di Sanza, who brings his rich, sharp New York flavor to the show, making for an interesting contrast with Brenda’s softer Midwestern touch.
 

Though she continues broadcasting and exploring theater roles, Brenda’s never lost sight of her first love, writing, having grown a successful career as an independent communications professional developing media pieces for clients as well as newsletters, marketing materials and scripts. Yet with all the work she has developed for others, there still was a story (or two or three) itching to leap out onto the page and in February 2008, it did.

Brenda co-authored her first work, a children’s book “Freddie, Hector and Tish: The Treasure-hunt Fish, a tale of three young fish living in Old Tampa Bay who learn the importance of embracing what makes each of us unique. Inspired by her previous work as a member of The Florida Aquarium’s theater staff, she along with a co-worker from the aquarium and a young illustrator created a cast of underwater characters to share life’s lessons with young readers, a labor of love that she says had sat on the shelf for ten years – literally.
 

Her latest book, a second in the same series, “The Treasure-Hunt Fish and Miss Bernadette’s Wish” was released end of last year and focuses on accountability and personal safety. Brenda says there are two other books already written to be published over the next year or two and finds herself busy making personal appearances locally to share her book with young readers and their parents.

“I really enjoy doing the author visits, because I tell the kids the story about working at the aquarium and read the story to them. You can see on some kids’ faces when it really hits home with regard to self-esteem. It’s really cool to go in there and let kids see that we’re not all the same, we all have our own strengths and weaknesses and we should be thrilled to be who we are and discover what life has to offer us. So I’ve turned into a positive crusader for positive self-esteem and positive messages,” she says.
 

Brenda also says that for her one of the most helpful things in getting word out about the books is through her networking activities. “I have found a number of great new friends through networking, because sometimes you need colleagues who can help keep you focused and give you a spiritual lift once in a while when you lose focus for a minute,” she says. “In these troubled financial times, I think people are even more supportive of small business than ever before. I know I prefer to work with small businesses, because I like to know who the people are that I’m working with and it’s really nice to know that you’re helping somebody else keep their dinner on the table.”
 

Brenda lives in Odessa with her husband and dogs Lucky and Bandit.
 

For additional information about Brenda or to order a copy of one of her Treasure-Hunt Fish series children’s books, go to www.treasurehuntfish.com. And tune in to Brenda’s weekly local radio show Monday nights at 7pm on WTAN 1340 AM or online at www.tantalk1340.com. One of Brenda’s guests on Monday, Jan. 11 will be TampaBaySkirt.com editor and community writer Chris Kuhn.