Karen Foley
They say New England roots go deep, and it seems it’s true. I’m proud to be a sixth-generation New Englander, and happy to be living in the same small community where both of my parents, my grandparents, and my great-grandparents were raised.
Growing up, I could always be found curled up with a book. When I wasn’t reading, I was writing, trying to capture on paper the endless stories that filled my imagination.
Story-telling and writing romantic fiction have been a big part of my life since I wrote my first romance at the age of twelve, featuring Tarzan as the hero. It seems even then I liked bare-chested men with lots of animal magnetism!
But the fact is, nothing gives me more pleasure than to create a story with memorable characters, a seemingly insurmountable conflict and, of course, a happy ending.
After graduating from the University of New Hampshire with a degree in English and Journalism, I did a short stint as a newspaper reporter but quickly realized I wasn’t cut out for “hard” news stories. Somehow, arriving at the scene of a house fire and asking a grief-stricken mother how she felt when she realized her child was still inside, just didn’t sit well with me. Instead, I obtained a job with the Federal government and have remained with them for twenty years.
I married John Foley, my former high-school sweetheart, in 1989. Ten days after the wedding we packed up our belongings and moved to Europe, where I continued my work with the Department of Defense. During those five wonderful years, we skied the Swiss and Italian Alps, hiked through the Scottish Highlands, explored Etruscan ruins, searched for Celtic ring forts, haggled our way through the Parisian flea markets and traipsed through every 13th and 14th century castle I could find.
I love living in small-town New England with my husband, our two daughters, a big, black dog and our Maine Coon cat, but if the opportunity to travel presents itself, I’m never one to turn it down!
