Born in Rota, Spain to a Spanish mother and American father, at 5, Tanya didn’t know a single word of English. Her first English words, courtesy of Grandma V were, “Many, many lights!” The airport was ablaze with them and hands plastered to the car window, nose to the glass, she was hungry to learn more. Language, she quickly discovered, more than planes or even actual bridges, was the thing that connected us all – no matter what walk of life we hailed from.

Fast forward to age 12: After a tonsillectomy, when the doc advised her parents to reward her with anything she wanted, ice cream lagged a distant second to the one thing she coveted most – her dad’s typewriter. And so she began writing at age 12.

Today, Tanya is a bestselling novelist and an award-winning journalist, who friends and family sometimes refer to as “Pollyanna.” But the name-calling is usually done with a healthy dose of good will, so she’s OK with it. Those who know her best, however, know that Pollyanna is just half her personality (she’s a Gemini, after all)!

Her first romance novel “Angel of fire” was published in 1992 for Avon Books. A New York Times bestselling author, she is a five-time nominee for a Romantic Times Career Achievement Award and her novels have been translated into Spanish, German, Italian, French, Russian and Chinese.