Abby Gaines wrote her first romance novel while still in her teens. Encouraged by her incredibly supportive parents, she wrote her novel longhand in school notebooks, supplying new pages daily to her biggest fan, her younger sister. When she’d finished, she typed up the manuscript and sent it to Mills & Boon in London—and was shocked when they rejected it.

No trace remains of that original work, and Abby shelved her writing dreams while she studied French, Japanese, German and Spanish for her BA—obviously she was worried there weren’t enough words in the English language to keep her amused. She also struggled through one paper in Economics, by far the most foreign language of them all.

After she graduated, Abby worked in sales and marketing in the computer industry, beginning her career in IBM, where she met her husband, then moving to a small high-tech PR consultancy. When her first child was born, she decided to be a stay-at-home mom, and was lucky enough to be able to build a new career as an award-winning freelance business journalist. Over the next few years, Abby had two more children, completed a post-graduate marketing qualification, and got halfway through a post-graduate diploma in theology before she just plain ran out of time and energy.

She needed a change…and it was about then that Abby’s ambition to write romance resurfaced.

Over the next few years, she cut back on the business journalism. She submitted several manuscripts to Harlequin, all the while attending romance writing classes and conferences, and reading every how-to book she could find. Rejections came thick and fast, and Abby realized that when she’d promised her husband she’d soon be supporting him on her inflated earnings as a bestselling author, she’d been at best over-optimistic…and at worst a stinking liar. To do her bit for the family fortunes, she took on the part-time role of editor of a speedway magazine—about as far removed from business journalism and romance writing as can be. But the speedway job turned out to be a lot of fun, and Abby became just as passionate about the sport as any longtime fan.

After five years of submitting to Harlequin, Abby sold her first book to Superromance in April 2006—and a month later, she sold to Harlequin’s NASCAR series. She’s now sold a total of 12 books, including a novella published in the A NASCAR Holiday 2 Christmas anthology from HQN.

Abby loves reading, traveling and cooking for friends, as well as spending time with her husband and children. She knows how to use a credit card as a lethal weapon, and proves it regularly by putting major dents in the household budget. Abby and her family recently moved back to the city after a few years in the country. Watch out, malls, here she comes!