Making up stories of her own has always been one of Michelle’s passions. She received her first rejection letter at the age of ten for Keri the Koala Baby, and has been writing ever since. A love of literature led her to major in English at the University of Newcastle.

 

She has worked an assortment of jobs. Everything from waitress at a wedding convention centre (where the staff oohed and ahhed over fairytale wedding dresses) to answering the complaints line at a call centre for a bank. All of which have provided her with endless ideas (and characters!) for stories.

 

Her own “happy-ever-after” came in 1998 when she eloped to England with husband Greg. They were married in Westminster – the town hall not the Abbey – lived on tinned soup for a month so they could afford to spend their wedding night in The Dorchester then flew out the next day to honeymoon in Paris. The sheer heady romance of it all made her wonder if she could breathe life into such encounters on the page.

 

She received “The Call” from Mills & Boon’s London office in February 2007 and her first book was released December that same year. She loves staring off into the middle-distance, pen in hand, and scrawling away furiously to bring her characters to life. To date, more than two million copies of her books have been sold in twenty-six different countries.

 

Her books have been nominated for numerous awards including the Romance Writers of America’s RITA, the Australian RUBY, the Booksellers Best Award (which she won in 2014), the National Readers Choice Awards, and many others. In 2019 she graduated with a PhD from the University of Newcastle. The topic was Popular Romance (of course) and Feminism.

 

She lives in a leafy suburb of Newcastle on Australia's east coast, is a sucker for happy endings, heroines who have a secret stash of chocolate, and heroes who know how to laugh. When she’s not writing (or reading), you’ll probably find her walking on the beach.

 

Michelle loves to hear from her readers and can be contacted at www.michelle-douglas.com