Most of the authors I’ve spoken with all have one thing in common. They ALWAYS wanted to be a writer. Most started writing from the time they could hold a crayon. But not me. I’ve always loved to read. Spent my summers as a teen with the Bronte sisters, Austen, Kathleen Woodwiss and Barbara Cartland. I still read voraciously. Romance is my first love, but I’m also a big murder mystery fan: Sue Grafton, Elizabeth George, and Anne Perry. Some of my favorite romance authors are Jayne Ann Krentz, Elizabeth Lowell, Linda Howard, Mary Balogh, Mary Jo Putney, Lisa Kleypas, and the wonderful Laura Kinsale. I grew up in a suburb of Dallas/Fort Worth, got married, moved to another suburb of DFW, and had 3 kids. I’ve always loved music and sang professionally at weddings and funerals, and directed my church choir.

While I was pregnant with my third child, health issues required me to be on partial bed rest for the last six months. This resulted in my spending a great deal more time reading. The more I read, the more a story of my own kept filling my head. The hero and his past, the heroine and her flaws, scenes emerged, then snatches of dialogue.

I *had* to write this story!

10 months later I’d finished the manuscript and a bookseller cyber-friend recommended RWA®. I joined the local chapter, North Texas RWA, and started learning the craft.

I was lucky enough to meet a fantastic critique partner, entered my story, called BET ON LOVE (later renamed HIGH-STAKES PASSION), in several contests, and revised the heck out of it. It received 2 richly deserved rejections before finally winning first place in the 2002 Golden Rose Contest!! The editor who placed me first eventually bought that book for Silhouette Desire.

I love the romance genre and believe with all my heart in the healing power of love.

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