Day Leclaire
Day Leclaire is an American author of more than forty romance novels. Biography. Early years. Day Leclaire started writing when she was just a child. After a long day of trying to keep occupied in the midst of a snowstorm, Leclaire and her three siblings ran out of things to do. In an effort to keep her own patience, Leclaire's mother challenged her to write her own story. That historical epic, based on Cinderella and set in the Wild West, was the beginning of her love of writing. Leclaire attended the University of California, Berkeley with the  intent to major in anthropology. Shortly thereafter, Leclaire met her husband, Frank, and the two married. They became entrepreneurs, running a film library in Berkeley, remodeling houses in Seattle, Washington, and then opening a produce market. When Leclaire became pregnant with their son Matt, she decided that she really wanted to be a writer. Writing career. Although Harlequin gave her encouraging feedback, Leclaire was not able to sell a book in the beginning. Her career seemed briefly stalled when her younger sister, Nancy, died of a brain tumor and Leclaire, alone in a new city, dealt with her grief. Her  husband challenged her to do something to occupy herself, and Leclaire once again turned to writing. Leclaire has since been nominated ten times for the Romance Writers of America RITA Award, the romance novelist's equivalent of an Oscar. Family. Leclaire was diagnosed with breast cancer in November 2000, and endured chemotherapy and radiation treatment as a result. Leclaire took a break from writing from 2004 to 2005 in an attempt to recover her creativity, but is finally back in her groove. In 2006 she began writing again, this time for Silhouette Desire, and had five books released in 2007 . She and her husband live on Hatteras Island in North Carolina. Leclaire's only son has recently graduated from the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, and plans to attend Virginia Tech for graduate studies.