American author Danielle Steel was born in 1947 in New York City. Long before Steel rose to become the fourth best-selling author of all time, she grew up in an affluent, religious household, and at first wanted to become a nun when she reached adulthood. Her parents frequently brought her with them to France, and Steel’s childhood was filled with experiences around the famous and affluent.
After her parents’ divorce, Danielle was raised mostly by her father, spending her young adult years in New York, where she studied fashion design at Parsons School of Design and then at New York University. Danielle Steel began writing during her time at university, and even though she married young – at the age of eighteen – by the time she was nineteen she’d completed her first manuscript.
Steel’s first novel, Going Home, was published in 1973 and was an instant success. Now nearly fifty novels later, Danielle Steel’s books have been translated into nearly thirty languages and are sold in more than fifty countries around the world. A staggering twenty-two books have so far been adapted for television, earning two Golden Globe nominations. In addition to her novels, Steel has also written five non-fiction works, a series of children’s books, and a number of screenplays, often based on her novels but with a few original screenplays as well.
Danielle Steel is now into her seventies but still going strong. She continues to write an average of three novels every year. Her most recent works – The Mistress, Dangerous Games, and Against All Odds – were published in 2017.
