GAYLE ROPER

 

 

 

 

“I have been in love with story all my life,” says Gayle Roper, the award winning author of more than forty-five books. “Give me a story with strong characters and a captivating plot, and I’m one happy reader. Or writer.”

 

Among Gayle’s awards are the prestigious Romance Writers of America’s RITA Award, the Carol Award from American Christian Fiction Writers, two Inspirational Readers Choice Awards, and three HOLT Medallions. She has been a Christy finalist three times and has received the Lifetime Achievement Award and the Reviewers Choice Award from Romantic Times Book Report.

 

For her work in training Christian writers Gayle has won special recognition from Mount Hermon Christian Writers Conference, St. Davids CWC, Florida CWC, and Greater Philadelphia CWC.  She lives in southeastern Pennsylvania. She enjoys reading, spending time at the family’s Canadian cottage, gardening, and eating out every time she can manage it.

 

You can learn more about Gayle by visiting her website.

 

WHO ARE YOUR FAVORITE AUTHORS?

 

 

I was fifteen when my mother held out a book to me.

 

“Here, Gayle. Read this.”

 

It was a Phyllis Whitney title, I’ve forgotten which one, and I was hooked on romantic suspense from that day forward. I’d spent the years prior immersed in Nancy Drew and then Judy Bolton. Did anyone but me read the delightful YA Judy Bolton series? Unlike Nancy and her friends, Judy got older, fell in love and married, but she always solved mystery after mystery as she aged.

 

But Phyllis Whitney raised the bar with titles like The Trembling Hills and Thunder Heights. Adult characters. Intense but chaste romance. And suspense!

 

 What a delight those early romantic suspense writers were to me. I still remember my surprise at the end of Victoria Holt’s Mistress of Mellyn. Mary Stewart’s The Ivy Tree remains one of the best double identity novels I’ve ever read.

 

 Stylistically these books are dated, but the story lines are strong. One of their secrets was the characters, regular people caught in a web of secrets, lies, and deceit as opposed to professional law enforcement personnel used to such experiences. They were people like me experiencing things I found fascinating to read about but would cause a coronary if they actually happened to me.

 

So I write romantic suspense. No surprise there. Sure, straight romance can be fun. So can straight suspense. But for me, it’s the combination that I find deeply satisfying.

 

Who introduced you to your favorites and what were they?

You can win a copy of Gayle's book, SHADOWS ON THE SAND, just by leaving a comment with your contact information!