In spite of being raised to play well with others, Jocelyn Kelley has always believed every woman needs to kick some butt sometimes. She learned this in third grade when the boys played soldiers and tried to relegate her to a non-combatant role. Soon she was taking the hill (or at least the playground tree) with them. Her assumption that women could stand shoulder-to-shoulder with men continued when she was offered a Direct Commission to the US Army and served as the first and only woman in her unit.Jocelyn's been writing “stories” all her life, and, when she decided to write for publication, she wanted to write what she read – historical romance. Why historicals? She explains it as, “I want my heroine to be able to pick up a weapon and use it without having to fill out reams of paperwork as she would in contemporary times. She might not use that weapon, but I want to give her the option to do so.” In other words, a kick-butt heroine. She found the kick-butt heroines she wanted to write with The Ladies of St. Jude's Abbey series that came to life in her mind while she was walking through Times Square in NYC, Since then, she's written four books in the series. In July 2007, she begins a new series – The Nethercott Tales – the stories of the three Nethercott sisters, who in Regency England are trying to prove that their father's lifelong search for ghosts wasn't in vain. But they never expect that the ghosts will help them stop a murderer or end a thousand year old curse. In her non-writing life, Jocelyn loves to travel and enjoys music. She was a soloist with a local group of Up With People, but limits her singing now to when nobody else is around. She lives in Massachusetts with her husband and three children.

After a 23-year AF career, Colonel Merline Lovelace launched a second career as a writer, basing many of her tales on her own experiences in uniform and on her travels all around the globe. The USA Today best-selling author now has more than 11 million copies of her books in print. Her works have won numerous awards, including the Romance Writers of America's prestigious RITA. Merline is especially proud to have been named the University of Oklahoma's Writer of the Year and the Oklahoma Female Veteran of the Year.

Cindy Dees started flying airplanes while sitting in her dad’s lap at the age of three and got a pilot’s license before she got a driver’s license. At age fifteen, she dropped out of high school and left the horse farm in Michigan where she grew up to attend the University of Michigan. After earning a degree in Russian and East European studies, she joined the U.S. Air Force and became the youngest female pilot in the history of the Air Force. She flew supersonic jets, VIP airlift and the “C-5” Galaxy, the world’s largest airplane. She also worked part-time gathering intelligence. During her military career, she traveled to forty countries on five continents, was detained by the KGB and East German secret police, she got shot at, flew in the first Gulf War, met her husband and amassed a lifetime’s worth of war stories. Her hobbies include professional Middle Eastern dancing, Japanese gardening and medieval reenacting. She started writing on a one-dollar bet with her mother and was thrilled to win that bet with the publication of her first book in 2001.

I've lived six lives in one and it all shows up in the books I write, one way or another. I was always a risk taker and broke mustangs at thirteen years old in Oregon. I learn to break them with love, not threat or pain. At 17 years old, I picked night-crawlers (worms) out in our Oregon orchards from 9pm to midnight, every night. I earned enough money to buy my school clothes and book. I also plunked down $600 to a flight company at the Medford, Oregon airport and asked them to teach me...a girl...to fly. I soloed in 12 hours, which is average. From that time until I left for the US Navy at 18, I had accrued 39 hours of flight time in my Cessna 150 single engine airplane. I was in the US military and was an AG3 (weather forecaster). There was no airplane club, so I couldn't fly when I was in the Navy. But I could look at the clouds in the sky ;-). Later, I flew in a B-52 bomber for a day and night mission (18 hours total), a T-38 Talon jet, USAF, where I was riding in a "chase plane" on a test flight in a Dragonfly jet. I was one of the first AFLA (American Fencing League of America) women fencers to fence with epee and sabre. These weapons were closed to women because they were too 'heavy' for a female to handle. I said baloney and fought the males and won half my bouts. I was part of a surge of women fencers on the East Coast in the 1970's to push for equality in the sport. Together, we changed the sport and changed the mind of the men. Today? In the Olympics? Women now fence in foil, epee and sabre, thanks to what we did as a vanguard showing the world it could be done. I then became a volunteer firefighter when I was a civilian once more, the first woman in an all - male fire department in West Point, Ohio for three years. I became a local expert not only in firefighting, driving the engine and tanker trunks, but also had training in hazardous material (Reynoldsburg Fire Academy, Columbus, OH). My books always reflect what I experienced. If you like edgy, gritty, deeply and emotionally intense love stories with sympathetic heroes and heroines, check out my newest series that will be available mid-Oct. 2015, and it incorporates much of what I have lived.

Award-winning author Elle James grew up as an air force military brat. She received her work ethic from her rock-solid father, her creative streak from her artistic mother and inspiration from her writing partner and sister, Delilah Devlin. As a former member of the army reserves and a current member of the air force reserves, she's traveled across the United States and to Germany, managed a full-time job, and raised three wonderful children. She and her husband have even tried their hands at ranching exotic birds (ostriches, emus and rheas) in the Texas hill country. Ask her, and she'll tell you what it's like to go toe-to-toe with an angry three-hundred-and-fifty-pound bird and live to tell about it! Her adventures in the army and air force reserves, and the wild antics of her life on a small ranch in Texas give her fodder for mystery, suspense and humor in her writing. Elle writes gothic, paranormal mystery for the Harlequin Intrigue line and paranormal romantic comedy for Dorchester Publishing. A former manager of computer programming and project management professionals, Elle is happy she now has the opportunity to pursue her writing full time.