Biography

Writing has been Karen Sandler's passion since the fourth grade when she vowed she would one day "be a writer." She took a circuitous route to the writing profession, however. She always wrote during her school years--poetry and short stories for the most part--but rather than major in English, she studied mathematics, physics and computer science. After earning a BA in math from a California state college and an MS in computer science from UCLA, Karen worked as a software engineer for nearly fifteen years.

With a move from the Los Angeles area to Northern California, Karen and her husband agreed she would stay home with their two sons and write full-time. In 1995, she optioned her first screenplay, ICER, a futuristic thriller, to a Southern California production company. After a round of re-writes that greatly improved the script, the production company submitted ICER to several big studios, including Dreamworks. Quite a roller-coaster ride. Unfortunately, the option expired without a sale.

In 1997, Karen sold her first romance novel to Kensington Publishing. She sold four others within a year--one more to Kensington, one to electronic publisher Hard Shell Word Factory and two to Berkley Jove. That flurry of sales was followed by a nail-biting two-year dry spell during which Karen sold nothing--nada, zip.

Before Karen decided that plumbing might not be such a bad profession after all, she struck gold again, selling four more books in quick succession, two to romance powerhouse Harlequin/Silhouette. She has since sold several others to Silhouette. She's also written and produced two short films.

Karen's two sons are grown now, one of them married and the other looking forward to spending a year or two in Japan.  With their (almost) empty nest, Karen and her real-life romance hero, Gary, are having the time of their life celebrating their own happily ever after.

Karen welcomes letters at P. O. Box 165, Rescue, CA 95672, or email at