Romance author Stephanie Laurens was born in Sri Lanka, which was at the time the British colony of Ceylon. Her family moved to Melbourne, Australia where she eventually received a Ph.D in Biochemistry. She and her husband moved to London for four years where they worked as research scientists. They returned to Melbourne where she worked in the field of cancer research and eventually ran her own research laboratory. She began writing romance novels as a hobby, but due to her success she became a full-time novelist. She is the author of the Cynster Family series and the Bastion Club series.