Johanna Lindsey is one of the world's most successful romance authors. She has written over 30 books, of which 54 million copies are in print and have been translated into 12 languages. Lindsey was born with the name Johanna Helen Howard on March 10, 1952. As a young wife and mother, Lindsey became a great fan of romance novels and wrote her first book, Captive Bride in 1977, on a whim when she was 25. To the young author's great surprise, it made The New York Times Bestsellers list. Lindsey had found a romance formula that worked. Take any setting past or present, introduce a rascally rakish male and a romantic heroine, let their hearts ignite with passion, lust, and love. Lindsey has… something of a cult following, following such titles as "Heart of Thunder", "Hearts Aflame", "A Heart So Wild", and ''Keeper of the Heart". She has loyal fans reading "Glorious Angel" and "Gentle Rogue" and legions of devotees buying her Malory family series. In 2014 her title, Stormy Persuasion, made The New York Times Best Seller List Because her father was in the U.S. Army, Lindsey traveled to many places as a child. She was born in Germany and grew up in Fort Knox, Kentucky. The family settled in Hawaii and Lindsey was married right after high school.Shohei Ooka (1909-1988) was born in Tokyo. He specialized in French at Kyoto University, and was graduated in 1932, after which he made a name as a translator of French literature. In 1944 he joined the Japanese Army, and was taken prisoner in the Philippine defeat of 1945, experiences that figure prominently in Fires on the Plain. In 1953-54 he became a Fulbright Visiting Professor at Yale University, and subsequently lectured on French literature at Meiji University in Tokyo. He authored two novels and contributed short stories and essays to almost every literary magazine in Japan. Shohei Ooka was awarded two literary prizes: the Yokomitsu Prize in 1949 for his first book, Record of a POW, and the Yomiuri Prize in 1952 for Fires on the Plain.