Susan Napier was born (appropriately, for a romance writer) February 14, St. Valentine's Day, in Auckland, New Zealand. She was 11 years old when her first story was published on the children's page of a daily newspaper and from that time on she was a confirmed scribbler. She says: "I've wanted to be a writer as long as I can remember possibly as a defense against a childhood of constantly being nagged to take my nose out of a book and get out into the fresh air! Now, at least I have a perfect excuse for always having my nose in a book. I also get the last laugh on my two elder brothers who were always snickering at me for reading romances." By the time she graduated from high school she was determined to make writing her full-time career.

Her first job was as a reporter at the Auckland Star, the city's leading evening newspaper. It was there that she met her archetypal hero, the newspaper's tall, dark, and handsome chief reporter, Englishman Tony Potter. In the best traditions for romance, Susan and Tony fell in love and married. After her marriage Susan left the newspaper to work for several years as a script writer-researcher-production assistant for a film company, and it is there that she learned the craft of writing dialogue, so essential for a successful novelist. After her sons, Simon and Ben, were born she worked as a freelance documentary scriptwriter before deciding that it was time to try her hand at writing the kind of fiction that she enjoyed reading.

Susan says: "At the time I started writing books I was mother to a baby and a toddler, with a husband who was happy to support me in my shot at becoming a published author. I gave myself five years (until the children started primary school) to succeed, and made it in three." It took Susan nearly two years to finish her first manuscript, which was accepted by Mills & Boon in London after an extensive rewrite, which took almost another year. By the time Sweet Vixen was published in 1983 she had had a second book accepted, and was working on a third. The year 2000 saw her 30th book published by Mills & Boon.

Susan and Tony still live in the house they bought soon after their marriage, next to a nature reserve in a leafy suburb of Auckland. However, extensive renovations have provided for their expanding lives, including a book-crammed office for Susan, sprawling living quarters and a large, solar-heated, saltwater pool in a sunny, paved courtyard. Tony now works for a national Sunday newspaper and retains his hero status in her life, serving as a constant source of inspiration and information for her books. Their sons, who are now studying at university in Auckland, divide their time between studying and competing at national and international track-and-field meets, still live in the family home; and with their girlfriends and friends, two cats (one timid and one bad-tempered), and Susan's elderly parents living nearby, her non-writing time is mostly taken up with coping with the happy chaos of family life. And reading romances, of course!