About Roy Montz

Roy Montz grew up where the Mississippi River bends like a great brown ribbon through New Orleans — the “city that care forgot.” Childhood meant fishing in muddy waters, camping on the batture, slipping into the river’s cool embrace on summer days, and watching the French Quarter hum with life and music. Mardi Gras was not an event; it was a season stitched into his bones. Though life later took him to a farm in central Mississippi, New Orleans never stopped being home, and its spirit remained joyful, unhurried, and deeply rooted in savoring the moment, which runs through every story he tells.

Not long after college, a coach introduced him to the phrase idée fixe — a French expression that, in Cajun country, means something more than “fixed idea.” It’s the belief that we become what we set our minds to. That lesson shaped not only Roy’s career and family life but also the way he approaches writing: with intention, persistence, and a refusal to settle for less than his best.

Before publishing his first book, Roy spent three decades with S.C. Johnson & Son, moving from Mississippi to Atlanta to Wisconsin, raising two sons (Matthew and Timothy) with his wife of more than fifty years, Julia. Along the way, he became a marathon runner, not chasing trophies but testing himself against his own limits. The discipline of training, the patience it demands, and the quiet triumph of finishing are the same qualities he brings to the page.

Today, Roy writes poems and short stories that draw on his Louisiana boyhood, his love of history, and his fascination with the small but defining moments that shape us. Every work is a labor of love — crafted in the quiet of the Mississippi countryside, often with Julia nearby, the two of them sharing the simple joy of a life well-lived.