Karen Mason was born in 1971 in London. She has written from an early age, brought up by a single mum, money was often in short supply and a weekend treat was often a choice between some chocolate and an exercise book. Karen usually chose the exercise book and used it to scribble down all the ideas in her head. Her crowing moment was in 1978...
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Karen Mason was born in 1971 in London. She has written from an early age, brought up by a single mum, money was often in short supply and a weekend treat was often a choice between some chocolate and an exercise book. Karen usually chose the exercise book and used it to scribble down all the ideas in her head. Her crowing moment was in 1978 coming second in the Blue Peter 'Write a Limerick for Goldie the Dog' contest - winning her a Blue Peter badge. In 1986, influenced by the trashy but brilliant Return to Eden, Karen and her best friend Cheryl set themselves a challenge to write a blockbuster novel during the summer holidays. After a few weeks Cheryl had written a paragraph and Karen had written a 250 page novel!
Bizarrely Karen never even considered having her novels published until whilst at university, a friend suggested she send them off to publishers. Trying this, she was met with the usual rejection letters but didn't let this put her off, and in 1993 entered (the now defunct) Me! magazine's 'Write a Blockbuster' competition with an early novel entitled 'Violet's Children' and to her delight, won second place (again!), the prize being a spanking new word processor on which she could finish her Final Year thesis.
Like most authors, Karen has suffered the usual rounds of rejection, usually from publishers and agents too snowed under to read the works actually sent to them. So, in early 2008 she decided to take matters into her own hands and taking the advice of a former colleague, published her own book with Lulu.com. Summerset was originally written in 1995 and has taken many guises and forms and even the first edition published was in need of revision.
Karen was shocked to discover people actually enjoyed reading her books and Summerset was handed round to quite a few people, building up a readership. From this new found support Karen decided to publish her second book - Mad About the Boy and in early 2009 this was followed by Two Become One. She is now busy editing and preparing Winner Takes It All, the hotly anticipated sequel to Summerset. With two more books 'The True Tale of Jezebel Cole' and 'The Pioneers' set for release in 2010.
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