Kate Hardy

For quite a while now, I've been saying that my books are all about drama, passion and danger. My readers, however, say other things. They say my books are full of warmth, heart and charm. And I can remember being at lunch with two senior editors, talking about voice, and saying that it's easier to see someone else's voice rather than your own. When I asked them what they thought my voice was, they both promptly chorused, 'Warmth.'

I'm out of denial now :o) I write traditional romance. I do bend the rules a little bit over sensuality, but basically my voice fits the Romance/Cherish line more than anything else. So that's where my books are published now, as well as Medical Romances.

I started reading at a precocious age, and I persuaded my parents to give me a typewriter for my sixth birthday, because I knew exactly what I wanted to be when I grew up: a writer. After I'd been to university to read English. And I worked to make sure I got my aims.

I started writing my first Mills & Boon when I was thirteen. My mother was horrified when she read it, until I confessed that I'd borrowed the love scenes from Sara Craven (who's a thoroughly nice woman and has since forgiven me for doing this!). My mum suggested that I should try again when I was a little bit older.

So. A speeded-up version of what happened next... University, specialising in Old English and Thomas Hardy. (Lots of heart, there.) Fall in love, graduate, buy house in Norwich, get dog, get married to Gerard, have first book accepted (erotic romance, since you ask), lovely husband agrees I can go freelance, first Black Lace novel accepted, son Chris born, become a health journalist, daughter Chloë born. Life doesn't get much better than this.

And then, at the age of six weeks, Chloë spent her first Christmas in hospital with bronchiolitis. The only way I could cope was to pretend it was happening to someone else. Gerry had suggested for a while that I ought to write writing medical romances (combining my two interests of health journalism and writing romance). So I started writing my first M&B medical, A BABY OF HER OWN, at my baby's bedside. Chloë recovered. My agent loved the book. So did M&B. It was accepted on Chloë's first birthday and published on her second birthday - and Ottakar's gave me a fab launch party.

2006 saw me achieve a private ambition: to be shortlisted for a major award. WHERE THE HEART IS was shortlisted for the Romantic Novelists' Association Romance Prize: probably my best-ever 40th birthday present!

And 2008 saw me achieve the next step: not only was I shortlisted again, but BREAKFAST AT GIOVANNI'S won the Romantic Novelists' Association Romance Prize 2008. In 2009 I was shortlisted again, with SOLD TO THE HIGHEST BIDDER and again in 2012 with A CHRISTMAS KNIGHT. At the beginning of 2010 I was shortlisted for Romantic Times' Reviewers Choice Award, Best Presents 2009, with SURRENDER TO THE PLAYBOY SHEIKH, and in the spring I was shortlisted for the Golden Quill Award with THE CHILDREN'S DOCTOR'S SPECIAL PROPOSAL.

In 2014, I was shortlisted TWICE for the Romantic Novelists' Association's Romance Prize, with HER REAL FAMILY CHRISTMAS and BOUND BY A BABY - and I'm thrilled to say that Darcey Bussell presented the award to me for BOUND BY A BABY.

In spring 2016, I'm writing my 71st title for M&B and planning a couple of other things I can't talk about yet, but soon...