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Extended Professional Bio

janeporterEven though New York Times and USA Today bestseller Jane Porter has over 15 million books in print, she is still a small town girl at heart, with deep roots in central California’s golden foothills, oak trees, and miles of farmland.

When Jane was thirteen her family moved to Europe for a year, and that abroad changed Jane forever, introducing her to different cultures and customs and creating a life long passion for books, travel, and adventure. Jane later spent much of her high school and college years abroad, studying in South Africa, Japan and Ireland.

Armed with a Bachelors degree in American Studies from UCLA, Jane immersed herself in sales and marketing, followed by another six years in the teaching trenches of junior high school before becoming a full-time fiction writer with an MA in Writing from the University of San Francisco.

Jane’s first published novel, The Italian Groom, sold to Harlequin Presents in 2000. Since then, Jane has been prolific, penning over 75 novels and novellas for four different publishers. Jane is a six-time finalist for the prestigious RITA award from Romance Writers of America, and won the RITA 2014 for her Tule novella, Take Me, Cowboy.

acceptingRITA

The publication of The Frog Prince in May 2005 marked a new avenue for Jane’s career. Taking a more literary turn than her previous work, Jane stayed close to home, using the backdrop of exciting San Francisco to look at the complex relationships between mothers, daughters and the men they love.

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Jane on the set of Flirting With Forty with the film’s two stars: Heather Locklear and Robert Buckley.

July 2006 marked the release of Jane’s second multi-bestselling modern lit novel, Flirting With Forty, set in Seattle and Hawaii. Selected as Redbook Magazine‘s Red Hot Read for 2006, Flirting with Forty was reprinted seven times in six weeks before being optioned by Sony for Lifetime TV. The film aired in December 2008 starring Heather Locklear and Robert Buckley, was one of Lifetime’s 3 most successful films of 2008 and is now available on DVD at major retail stores.

Jane’s highly anticipated third modern lit, Odd Mom Out released September 2007 generated considerable buzz and earned critical acclaim including 4 1/2 Stars, Top Pick award from RT Magazine and a RITA nomination from Romance Writers of America as best single title with romantic elements. Mrs. Perfect, the follow up to Odd Mom Out, hit the shelves May 2008 with tremendous success pleasing both the critics and readers. USA Today called Mrs. Perfect ‘the perfect beach read’.

Jane’s fifth and sixth novels with Grand Central, Easy On The Eyes (2009) and She’s Gone Country (2010) continued to explore Jane’s themes of the complexity of women’s lives today, whether it be aging, motherhood, or parenting a child with depression.

After sixteen years in Greater Seattle, Jane returned to California, just in time for the launch of her first Brennan Sister novel, The Good Woman, a September 2012 release from Berkley Trade. The award-winning The Good Daughter followed in February 2013, and the final story in the trilogy, The Good Wife, hit store shelves September 2013.

In 2021, Jane had two new movies made for GAC family network based on stories from her Sheehan series: An Autumn Romance (originally The Tycoon’s Kiss) and A Christmas Miracle for Daisy (book by the same name).

Jane continues to write romance and women’s fiction for Harlequin, Penguin and Tule Publishing from her historic Ole Hanson home in San Clemente that she shared with her surfer husband and three active sons. When she’s not on the beach or speaking to writers, she’s at her desk working on her next novel.