About Jennifer

Hello and welcome to my website. Here you’ll find tons of information about one of my all-time favourite authors, the great Georgette Heyer. I’ve been a Heyer fan since I first read her books while living in the jungle in Papua New Guinea. The tiny YWCA library in the remote mining town was heavily stocked with Georgette Heyer and Robert Ludlum novels. I loved them both and read all that I could get my hands on, but it was Georgette who stayed with me, and Georgette who was to change my life.

Fast forward five years and I was living in the Middle East and reading Heyer while raising our family and studying off-campus for my Bachelor of Arts degree in History and Literature. Somewhat to my surprise (this was before I knew what a huge bestseller she was and how beloved by four generations of readers), that town library also had a large collection of Heyer novels. I read and re-read those brilliant books and by the time we went home to Australia three years later I knew I wanted to know more about Georgette Heyer.

My original idea was to write some kind of “Georgette Heyer Handbook” but when I mentioned the idea to my friend and senior lecturer, Roy Hay, he said “That’d make a fantastic PhD”. In that moment I had an epiphany  – a vision of me in a puffy hat – and my destiny was sealed! I did an Honours degree, won a scholarship to the University of Melbourne and settled down to three amazing years of focus on Georgette Heyer’s life and Regency novels. It was a dream come true!  Doing my Doctorate opened a whole new world to me and brought me wonderful friendships, extraordinary research moments, and so many amazing discoveries – including several archives of previously untapped Georgette Heyer letters. I became friends with her family, including her son, the kind and generous, Sir Richard Rougier; her first biographer, the late, great Jane Aiken Hodge; and her loved daughter-in-law, Susie, Lady Rougier, along with several other people who had known and loved Georgette Heyer.

I spent three very happy years completing my PhD and I carried a copy of Heyer’s first Regency novel, Regency Buck, throughout my graduation ceremony – what an amazing day that was! Then, with so much Regency material to hand I began writing my first book, Georgette Heyer’s Regency World, an illustrated companion to Heyer’s 26 Regency novels and published by Random House UK and Sourcebooks USA in 2005.

In the course of my research I’d been lucky enough to become friends with Jane Aiken Hodge and on our very first meeting she had given me her 12 folders of research and interview notes from her own Heyer biography, The Private World of Georgette Heyer (1984). That gift, along with all of the untapped letters, interviews, visits to Heyer’s homes and a wealth of other information, much of it new and unknown to her fans, inspired me to write a new Heyer biography. In 2011 Random House and Sourcebooks published Georgette Heyer: Biography of a Bestseller. I’m proud to say that both the biography and Regency World are still in print and next year will mark the 20^th anniversary of my first book. But, more than anything, my books’ success is a testament to Georgette Heyer’s enduring popularity and her continuing best-seller status. In 2015 she was awarded a well-deserved and prestigious English Heritage Blue Plaque for her contribution to British culture and literature. Unveiled by popular English writer and actor, Stephen Fry, he spoke eloquently about Georgette Heyer’s remarkable literary achievements.

I hope you enjoy discovering more about Georgette Heyer from my books and my website and if you enjoy those then you might also enjoy my own novels:

NYT bestselling author Stephanie Laurens described Jane Austen’s Ghost as ‘A tour de force of the imagination’ and this genre-bending contemporary-historical romance has a delicious Regency twist. Just as you’d expect from someone after reading Heyer for more than three decades!

My YA novels The Cinderella Moment and The Rapunzel Dilemma, originally published by Penguin Australia are being reprinted this year with fab new covers. They’ll also be joined by the third and final book in my modern Fairytale Trilogy, The Snow-White Rebellion. I’m excited to be finishing that book this year!

Apart from writing and reading, I’m a keen gardener, having discovered a latent green thumb in 2014. After spending years accidentally murdering plants, I’ve been astonished to discover that I can actually grow things from seeds and cuttings. Over the past ten years we’ve transformed our garden from pretty dull to gloriously beautiful with something to surprise you around every corner. We now open our garden every second year to raise money for cancer research and I’m often tempted into the garden – especially when stuck on a plot or wondering what next my characters will do – the garden always solves my problem! I love my garden and writing and so many things about life, but my family is where my heart lies and my husband and three children continue to inspire and support me. Life is a roller-coaster but I’m glad to have you along for the ride!

Thanks for visiting my website and please do get in touch via my contact page if you have a Georgette Heyer question or comment.