Johanna Lindsey

Johanna Lindsey was an American writer of historical romance novels. Her books sold at least 60 million copies, according to her publisher, Simon & Schuster, and she ranked among the leading romance writers of her era. Most popular among her books are the stories of the Malory-Anderson family, a saga of Regency England.

Johanna Helen Howard was born in Frankfurt, Germany, where her father, Edwin Dennis Howard, a soldier in the U.S. Army, was stationed. Her family moved to the United States when she was about 5. Her father always dreamed of retiring to Hawaii, and after he passed away in 1964, Johanna and her mother settled there to honor him. Here, Johanna attended intermediate school and high school.

In 1970, when she was still in school, she started work in a data processing program but left it when she married Ralph Lindsey, becoming a young housewife.

The marriage had three children: Alfred, Joseph, and Garret, who already have made her a grandmother. After her husband's death, Johanna moved to Maine, New England, to stay near her family.

Johanna Lindsey wrote her first book, Captive Bride, in 1977, "on a whim," and the book was a success. She followed it over the next four years with A Pirate’s Love, Brave the Wild Wind, Fires of Winter, and Paradise Wild.

Johanna's books span the various eras of history, including books set in the Middle Ages, the American "Old West" and the popular Regency England-Scotland. She has even written a few sci-fi romances.

“I enjoy happy-ending love stories more than any other type of reading. Romance is what comes out of me.” Lindsey said.

Her most recent, Temptation’s Darling, published in 2019, is about a countess's plans to marry off her daughter to an arrogant scoundrel in 19th-century England.

Johanna Lindsey died in Nashua, N.H. The cause was complications of treatment for Stage 4 lung cancer. She was 67.