Susan MacBryde's professional career began in New York advertising and public relations agencies for corporate accounts, followed by marketing, fundraising and strategic planning for non-profit human service organizations. She also volunteered as a community organizer and activist in the Occupy Movement. When in her sixties, and with a degree in Community and Human Services Management, she served in the U.S. Peace Corps as an NGO Specialist / Community and Youth Development Advisor in Armenia, followed by service as a Literacy Advisor for the faculty of an elementary school in Jamaica.

Now retired in Ecuador, Susan enjoyed service on the founding board of an environmental NGO, offering fundraising and organizational development assistance. She notes: "I cannot imagine a more worthwhile endeavor for myself at this time than supporting Indigenous nations in the Amazon Basin in preserving autonomy in their territories and the extraordinary biodiversity of life that still exists there. We are at our peril if we don't succeed in impacting ecological and human survival globally." Jaguar Dreams grew out of this experience and is Susan's first work of literary fiction.