A Santini Christmas

Born to an Air Force family at an Army hospital, USA TODAY Bestselling author Melissa Schroeder has always been a little bit screwy. She was further warped by her years of watching Monty Python and her strange family. Her love of romance novels developed after accidentally picking up a Linda Howard book. From then on, she was hooked. She read close to 300 novels in one year and decided romance was her true calling instead of the literary short stories and suspense stories she had been writing. After many attempts, she realized that romantic comedy, or at least romance with a comedic edge, was where she was destined to be. 

Influences in her writing come from Nora Roberts, Jenny Crusie, Susan Andersen, Amanda Quick, Jayne Anne Krentz, Julia Quinn, Christina Dodd, and Lori Foster. Since her first release in 2004, Melissa has written close to thirty short stories, novellas and novels released with seven different publishers in a variety of genres and time periods. Those releases included a 2005 Eppie Finalist, Two Capa finalists, and an International ebook best seller in June of 2005. Surrender was named top Category Romance by Authors After Dark, and she was named Author of the Year and Most Accessible Author.

Since she was a military brat, she vowed never to marry military. Alas, fate always has her way with mortals. Her husband is an Air Force major, and together they have their own military brats, two girls, and an adopted dog-daughter. They live wherever the military sticks them, which, she is sure, will always involve heat and bugs only seen on the Animal Discovery Channel. In her spare time, she reads, complains about bugs, travels, cooks, reads some more, watches her DVD collections of Arrested Development and Seinfeld, and tries to convince her family that she truly is a delicate genius. She has yet to achieve her last goal.

She has always believed that romance and humor go hand in hand. Love can conquer all and as Mark Twain said, "Against the assault of laughter, nothing can stand." Combining the two, she hopes she gives her readers a thrilling love story, filled with chuckles along the way, and a happily ever after.