Gwynne Forster

Gwynne Forster

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Photo Credit - T. Johnson, AALBC.com

Gwynne Forster was born in North Carolina and grew up in Washington, D. C., where she lived before going to New York to work as a demographer at the United Nations. When she left United Nations to form a working partnership with her husband, she was chief of the Fertility Studies Section of the Population Division. As such, she was responsible for research and analysis of social, economic, cultural and demographic factors and conditions that influence fertility levels and trends throughout the world. The studies were published under the United Nations imprimatur and in the name of its Secretary-General. She lives in New York City with her husband (who is also a demographer) of twenty-five years.

Heather Covington with Gwynne Forster.
Covington included Forster in her book Literary Divas: Top 100+ Most Admired African-American Women in Literature

She holds bachelors and masters degrees in sociology and a masters degree in economics/demography, as well as graduate credits from Columbia University. As a demographer, she has published widely. Her extensive travels for the United Nations and, later, for the International Planned Parenthood Federation (London Office) have taken her to Brazil, Mexico, most European countries and throughout Asia, Africa and the Caribbean. Her work on these trips included representing the Secretary-General of the United Nation, lecturing, conducting workshops and delivering research or policy papers at conferences.

She has acted as president of the Board of Directors of the volunteer library that serves the eight thousand people who live on her community. She is currently a member of the board and, occasionally, volunteers at the library.

Gwynne Forster tell how she was first published

Since becoming a published author of romance novels, Gwynne has lectured on various phases of the writing business. At the 1995 Romantic Times (RT) Conference in Dallas, she lectured on techniques of selling a manuscript, including writing query letters and synopses and relating the story orally and in writing to agents and editors. She also spoke on these topics at a Howard University Seminar in June 1995, and at the March 1996 annual conference of Romance Writers of America/ New York City Club which was convened in Melville, Long Island. She held a workshop on the subject at the 1996 Romantic Times conference in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and lectured on fiction writing at the African American Women Writers Conference, University of the District of Columbia, in April, 1997. In August 1997, Gwynne was guest luncheon speaker at the annual convention of Waldenbooks managers in the Northeast Corridor. Since February, 1998, Gwynne has lectured on all aspects of fiction writing at the branch libraries of the (New York City) Queens Borough Library system, and has been guest lecturer on aspects of romance writing at Romance Writers of America groups in Connecticut and in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

She [Ms. Forster] is also a free-lance non-fiction writer. Her latest article is a profile of Kofi Annan, United Nations Secretary-General, the cover story of the April/May issue of Crisis Magazine. Crisis is the media organ of the NAACP.

-- Read the rest of this fascinating author's profile at Gwynne Forster Homepage http://www.gwynneforster.com/

Chairman Emeritus, Kensington Books Walter Zacharius, Gwynne Forster & AALBC.com Founder, Troy Johnson

Forbidden Temptation (Kimani Romance)
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Gwynne Forster

Mass Market Paperback: 256 pages
Publisher: Kimani (November 1, 2007)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0373860404

Read an Excerpt

Sex changed everything…

After marrying off her sisters, Ruby Lockhart could finally concentrate on her career. After all, love wasn't in the cards for the pragmatic Ruby. Only she could wake up the morning after her sister's wedding with a gorgeous, sexy man in her bed and have him be her best friend!

Mr. Sexy—aka Luther Biggens, ex-navy SEAL—had always been Ruby's rock. Now he was her problem. She couldn't look at him without remembering the ways he'd pleasured her. More troubling than how she'd ended up in bed with Luther was that Ruby wanted to do it again… and again….

Getting Some of Her Own
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Publisher: Dafina (August 1, 2007)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0758213107

After an absence of sixteen years, Susan Pettiford has come home to North Carolina, this time for good. Thanks to an inheritance, she can start her own interior design business. But it’s not quite the life Susan hoped for. Single at thirty-four, she now faces a challenge that forces her to accept one of her dreams will never come true. Battling sadness, Susan decides to engage in a fling…

Architect Lucas Hamilton couldn’t be more surprised by Susan’s dinner invitation—after all, she’s the same woman who clearly rebuffed his advances at a recent party. Still, his curiosity overcomes his doubts. The result is a night of seduction neither can forget yet neither intends to repeat. While Susan focuses on her work and a new friendship with her troubled neighbor Cassie, Lucas focuses on his goal to become more wealthier than the biological father he resents for being absent from his life. Then, when Lucas’s father resurfaces, he finds himself turning to Susan for counsel. As the complexities of family, work, and their undeniable attraction lead their paths to cross repeatedly, their feelings for each other strengthen. But the secret Susan is hiding from Lucas may destroy any future they share…

Praise for Gwynne Forster

“Gwynne creates a fictional world of ideas and passions…truly modern women and men struggling with a torrent of issues…delivered in accomplished prose that challenges us to think, feel, and imagine.” —Robert Fleming, author of The Wisdom of the Elders

“Touching, thought-provoking.” —Kimberla Lawson Roby, New York Times bestselling author on If You Walked in My Shoes

“An unforgettable read.”—Donna Hill, author of If I Could on When Twilight Comes

When You Dance with the Devil
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ISBN: 0758213085
Format: Paperback, 304pp
Pub. Date: August 2006
Publisher: Kensington Publishing Corporation

“Gwynne creates a fictional world of ideas and passions…truly modern women and men struggling with a torrent of issues…delivered in accomplished prose that challenges us to think, feel, and imagine.”
—Robert Fleming, author of The Wisdom of the Elders and The African American Writer’s Handbook

After the death of her bitter and demanding mother, Sara Jolene Tilman finds herself alone in the world for the very first time—and ready for a fresh start. Leaving behind the pain and isolation of her former life, Sara becomes Jolene, and moves into the aptly named Thank the Lord Boarding House, a modest oceanside sanctuary that houses eleven other “misguided souls,” as proprietess Fannie Johnson thinks of them. Surrounded by strangers, Jolene is forced to confront how socially awkward—and achingly lonely—she really is. Taking care of others is all she has ever known. Can she learn to take care of herself? But as Jolene naively begins her stumbling—sometimes treacherous—search for love and belonging, she finds she is not alone…

Disillusioned by romance and material success, Richard Peterson has decided to give up his high-powered international career and return to his U.S. roots. On the advice of a friend, Richard registers at Thank the Lord Boarding House. But while he planned to shed the trappings of wealth along with his business suit, he is taken aback by the humble surroundings, including the down-to-earth housemates for whom his status means nothing. Nonetheless, as Richard is forced to turn inward, he is also drawn into local life and discovers simple pleasures—including an unexpected new friendship and a promising new relationship.

Behind the scenes is Fannie Johnson, shepherding her unlikely flock—two of whom just may surprise her. For in a community where character is everything, Jolene and Richard must struggle to find themselves at last.

Her Secret Life
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ISBN: 1583147713
Format: Mass Market Paperback, 256pp
Pub. Date: July 2006
Publisher: Kimani

By day, she's Jacqueline Ann Parkton, Ph.D. But come nightfall, she lets her hair down.…

The patrons of the swanky gentleman's club Allegory, Inc. know her as Jackie Parks, the chestnut-brown beauty with legs up to there, who serves them drinks with a wink and a sultry smile. Business mogul Warren Holcomb has taken a particular interest in Jackie -- though she's not exactly the type of woman you'd take home to mama.

Or is she? As Warren is about to find out, things aren't always what they seem. Will Jacqueline's charades put an end to their hot new romance -- or will the truth set them free?

Destiny's Daughters
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with Gwynne Forster, Parry Brown and Donna Hill

ISBN: 0758212380
Format: Paperback, 308pp
Pub. Date: February 2006
Publisher: Dafina Books

In this powerful collection, four acclaimed writers put their talents together to tell the unforgettable story of three sisters separated as infants-and how their paths finally cross in adulthood.

Leticia, Jamilla and Clarissa Holmes each know that they're one in a set of quadruplets-but that's about all they know. Now they're adults, thirty-three-year old women who are as different as can be. But they have one thing in common: they have never given up on the idea of one day finding each other.

Blues From Down Deep
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ISBN: 157566920X
Format: Hardcover, 304pp
Pub. Date: March 2003
Publisher: Kensington Publishing Corporation

No one brings home the power of family to shape and heal us like national bestselling author Gwynne Forster. Now, in BLUES FROM DOWN DEEP, she crafts an unforgettable story of one woman’s search for the family she’s never known—but whose pull she’ll never be able to escape again…

BLUES FROM DOWN DEEP

Regina Pearson has never really known any family other than her late, widowed father. He cut ties with his family in North Carolina long ago and moved to Hawaii with Regina’s mother, then raised Regina alone following his wife’s accidental death. Living among the native Hawaiians so different from herself created in Regina an aching for people to call her own. Regina finds among her late parents’ effects a letter written forty years earlier that leads to her mother’s sister, Maude, a been-there, done-that blues singer, and her nonagenarian maternal grandfather, head of the extended family in New Bern, North Carolina.

For Regina, going to North Carolina to see Aunt Maude is the chance of a lifetime—an opportunity to bond with the people who share her roots, her blood, and her heart, and find the pieces of her she’s been lonely for all these years. But the big, warm, loving family Regina’s dreamed about is nowhere in sight. Instead, she finds uncles, aunts, and cousins torn apart by secrets and lies, petty squabbles and heartbreaking wounds stretching back for years—a contentious clan ready to draw Regina front-and-center into their troubles whether she wants to be there or not. And just as her new family conflict threatens to overwhelm her, Regina discovers a passionate connection she hadn’t counted on with a man who’s ready to show her what real family’s all about—and what it takes to keep the love flowing.

Filled with heartfelt wit and homespun wisdom, BLUES FROM DOWN DEEP is a joyous reminder that love comes when we least expect it, from every side of life, and the family that makes us crazy can also lead us home to the place where we belong.

Love Me or Leave Me Click to order via Amazon ISBN: 1583146229 Format: Mass Market Paperback, 317pp Pub. Date: September 2005 Publisher: BET
When Twilight Comes Click to order via Amazon Format: Hardcover, 288pp. ISBN: 1575669196 Publisher: Kensington Publishing Corporation Pub. Date: February 2002 Making the switch from contemporary romance (Secret Desire) to mainstream African-American fiction, Forster reverses King Lear by giving the good youngest daughter the keys to the kingdom. Widowed matriarch Marge Hairston is the power behind the Woodmore Times, "North Carolina's most influential African-American newspaper." But when Marge becomes seriously ill, she must name a successor. Neither Drogan nor Cassie, her self-centered older children, wants the responsibility, so it falls to quiet Sharon to give up her own dreams in order to try to fill her mother's big shoes. --Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.	Beyond Desire (Click title to order on-line) Publisher: Kensington Publishing Corporation Date Published: December 1998 Format: Trade Paper Amanda Ross is thrilled when she is appointed junior high school principal in Caution Point, North Carolina. But her promotion will only be a pipe dream if the board of education discovers that she's pregnant--and single. She never expected her baby's father to desert her, but explanations won't satisfy a small town's rumor mill. A husband is what she needs, and handsome music engineer Marcus Hickson looks like a practical answer to her problem.
Fools Rush In (Click title to order on-line) Publisher: B E T Books Due August 1999 Format: Mass Market Paperbound Wedding Bells (Click title to order on-line) with Francine Craft, Niqui Stanhope May 1999, Trade Paper	Ecstasy (Click title to order on-line) Publisher: Kensington Publishing Corporation Date Published: June 1997 Format: Mass Market Paperbound School teacher Jeannetta Rollins was about to lose something infinitely precious...her eyesight. Only surgeon Mason Fenwick had the skills to perform the delicate operation to remove the tumor that was causing her blindness. But the brilliant doctor had left medicine after a tragedy he'd been powerless to prevent, and he refused to take her case. But Jeannetta was nothing if not persistent. They would meet on an unusual journey--a trip around the world. Mason had to admire Jeannetta, a woman who would risk anything for the chance to see again. Even her heart. But now it was Mason whose emotions were on the line: the better he got to know the proud, breathtakingly lovely Jeannetta, the more he wanted her...and wanted her to be whole again. Now her happiness---and their future--were in his hands. All he had to do was trust himself...and trust his heart.