I've been writing since I was twelve, but I started creating stories way before that (just ask my parents). I read my first romance novel when I was sixteen, and though I don't remember the name, I do remember the storyline. An arid western climate, a couple who parted years before on bad terms only to be thrown back together in the midst of danger and uncertainty. The mix of danger, lust and, finally, love was a heady mix. I was instantly hooked, but I didn't start really writing the genre until I needed an escape.

In the middle of my senior year of high school my family was transferred. I stayed behind to graduate with my friends while my parents moved several hundred miles away. That summer, living in a town hundreds of miles away from all my friends (staying behind was, in hindsight, a mistake) I found myself in limbo. I was headed for college in the fall, but in the meantime I didn't know what to do with myself. A responsible, smart teen would have gone out and gotten a job, made some friends, and had fun...

I didn't. Instead, I started working on my first romance novel. I set it in Texas (go figure) in the mid- to late-nineteenth century. The heroine was on her own (big surprise) and the hero was a tall, strapping young man who just so happened to own his own ranch. Our heroine decided to cut her hair and dress as a boy to obtain work on said hero's ranch. After many trials and much confusion, they ended up happily ever after.

I didn't finish the story that summer. I went to college, became engaged, and spent the next couple years in that scene. I majored in English and wrote story lines on the side. If I didn't have at least two story lines to work on at the end of the day, I felt lost. I still feel lost today if I don't have some storyline running through my head. I come home from a stressful day and I write. If I'm stuck in a rut, I read a romance novel. Occasionally I switch it up with a satire or fantasy novel, but I always end up writing about romance, about the relationships between men and women.

Writing in the romance genre is my passion. Hence, Passion for Romance.

Stop by again in a couple of days and I'll tell you a bit more about that first taste of Texan relations.