Julia Quinn

Julie Pottinger
Pottinger with Rita award in 2008
Born	Julie Cotler 1970 (age 50–51) USA
Pen name	Julia Quinn
Occupation	Novelist
Nationality	American
Period	1994–present
Genre	Romance, historical
Website
juliaquinn.com

Julie Pottinger (née Cotler; born 1970), better known by her pen name Julia Quinn, is a best-selling American historical romance author.^[1] Her novels have been translated into 29 languages,^[2] and she has appeared on the New York Times Bestseller List 19 times.^[3] Her Bridgerton series of books has been adapted for Netflix by Shonda Rhimes under the title Bridgerton.^[4][5]

Early life[]

Pottinger was born as Julie Cotler in 1970 to Jane and Stephen Lewis Cotler.^[6] She has three sisters: Emily, Abigail, and Ariana.^[7][8][9] She is Jewish.^[10] She was raised primarily in New England, although she spent much of her time in California following her parents' divorce.^[2]

Since her early childhood, Pottinger thoroughly enjoyed books. At age 12, her father disagreed with her choices of reading material, Sweet Dreams and the Sweet Valley High book series, and told her she could keep reading them only if she could prove that they were good for her. She promptly told him that she was studying them in order to write one herself. Challenged to prove that she meant her statement, Pottinger sat down at their computer and wrote her first two chapters. After finishing her novel three years later, she submitted it to Sweet Dreams, but was rejected.^[11]

Education and career[]

Pottinger graduated from Harvard with a degree in Art History. During her senior year of college, she realized that she did not know what she wanted to do with her degree and decided to attend medical school. That decision required her to attend two additional years of college to complete the science prerequisites necessary to apply for medical school.^[3]

To occupy herself during the long days of studying science, Pottinger began to write light-hearted Regency novels.^[1] A few weeks after she was accepted to medical school, she discovered that her first two novels, Splendid and Dancing At Midnight, had been sold at auction, an unusual occurrence for a novice romance author.^[12] She postponed medical school for two years while she wrote two more novels.^[11]

By the time Pottinger finally entered Yale School of Medicine to realize her dream of being a doctor, three of her books had been published. After only a few short months of studying medicine, however, Pottinger realized that she preferred writing to medical study. She left medical school and devoted herself full-time to her writing.^[11]

Pottinger considers herself a feminist and gives her heroines feminist qualities that are not necessarily true to the most prevalent attitudes of the times her novels are set in.^[1] Her books are noted for being full of humor, with sharp, witty dialogue.^[11] The novels are primarily character-driven, lacking the great external conflicts that many romance novels employ. One of her novels, When He was Wicked, was highly unusual for a romance novel, as the first four chapters actually describe the heroine in a happy marriage with someone who is not the hero, and then shows the death of the original husband and deals with the grief of both the heroine and hero before allowing the second love story to flourish.^[12]

Most of her books are dedicated to her husband, Paul Pottinger, often with references to amusing alternate titles for the work. She won the Romance Writers of America RITA Award for 2007 for On the Way to the Wedding and again for 2008 for The Secret Diaries of Miss Miranda Cheever. When she won for 2010 for What Happens in London, she became (at the time) the youngest member and is now one of only 16 authors to be inducted into the RWA Hall of Fame.

In 2003, she enjoyed the rare honor of being profiled in Time Magazine, an accomplishment few romance novelists have achieved. In 2005 Publishers Weekly gave To Sir Phillip, With Love a rare starred review, and later named it one of the six best mass market original novels of the year.^[3]

Each of her last 17 novels has appeared on the New York Times Bestseller List, with Mr. Cavendish, I Presume hitting number one in October 2008. Most recently, The Girl With the Make-Believe Husband was on the NYT list in June 2017. Additionally to those, both her Lady Whistledown anthologies appeared on the NY Times list, as did both of her novel-in-three-part collaborations with Connie Brockway and Eloisa James (The Lady Most Likely and The Lady Most Willing), and the Bridgertons: Happily Ever After collection of Bridgertons second epilogues.^[3]

Personal life[]

In 2001, Pottinger won $79,000 on The Weakest Link.^[13] She is an avid reader and posts recommendations of her favorite books on her Facebook page.

Pottinger resides in Seattle, Washington,^[14][15] with her husband and two children.^[16][17][18]

On June 29, 2021, Quinn's sister and father, Ariana Elise Cotler and Stephen Lewis Cotler, respectively, were killed in a car accident in Kaysville, Utah.^[19]

Recognition[]

• 1997 – Everything and the Moon nominated for Best Regency Historical by Romantic Times Magazine^[11]
• 2001 – Finalist in the Romance Writers of America's RITA Awards
• 2002 – Romancing Mister Bridgerton voted one of the top ten books of the year by RWA membership
  Finalist for the RWA RITA Awards in the Long Historical category
• 2002 – To Sir Phillip, With Love named one of the six best mass market original novels of the year by Publishers Weekly
• 2003 – Quinn was profiled in Time magazine
• 2007 – Received Romance Writers of America RITA Award for Best Long Historical Romance, for On the Way to the Wedding
• 2008 – Received Romance Writers of America RITA Award for Best Regency Historical Romance, for The Secret Diaries of Miss Miranda Cheever
• 2010 – Received Romance Writers of America RITA Award for Best Regency Historical Romance for What Happens in London^[20]
• 2010 – Quinn was inducted into the Romance Writers of America Hall of Fame^[20]
• 2016 – Quinn taught the inaugural romance writing course at the Yale Summer Writers Conference^[21]
• 2018 – Announcement that Quinn's Bridgerton series would be adapted for Netflix by Shonda Rhimes

Bibliography[]

Splendid Trilogy[]

• Splendid (1995)
• Dancing at Midnight (1995)
• Minx (1996)
• "A Tale of Two Sisters" in Where's My Hero? (2003, anthology with Lisa Kleypas and Kinley MacGregor)

Lyndon Sisters[]

• Everything and the Moon (1997)
• Brighter Than the Sun (1997)

Agents of the Crown[]

• To Catch an Heiress (1998)
• How To Marry a Marquis (1999)

Bridgerton series[]

• The Duke and I (2000)
• The Viscount Who Loved Me (2000)
• An Offer From a Gentleman (2001)
• Romancing Mister Bridgerton (2002)
• To Sir Phillip, With Love (2003)
• When He Was Wicked (2004)
• It's In His Kiss (2005)
• On the Way to the Wedding (2006)
• The Bridgertons: Happily Ever After (2013)

The Bridgerton family consists of eight siblings and their widowed mother. In the novels, the Bridgertons are well respected and favored among British society. The Bridgertons are an extremely loving and tight-knit clan. The series comprises eight books in which each of the siblings finds true love. Each book is set against the backdrop of upper English society during the period of Regency England.

On the Way to the Wedding won the Romance Writers of America RITA Award in 2007. In 2002, To Sir Phillip, With Love was named one of the six best mass market original novels of the year by Publishers Weekly. Several titles in the series have been on The New York Times bestseller list.

Quinn has published six "second epilogues," one each for The Viscount Who Loved Me, An Offer From A Gentleman, Romancing Mister Bridgerton, To Sir Phillip, With Love, When He Was Wicked, and It's In His Kiss, as ebooks. The final collection of eight second epilogues—those six, plus second epilogues from The Duke and I and On the Way to the Wedding, plus a short story about Violet, the Bridgerton matriarch—was released as The Bridgertons: Happily Ever After on April 2, 2013.^[22]

Two Dukes of Wyndham[]

• The Lost Duke of Wyndham (2008)
• Mr. Cavendish, I Presume (2008)

According to Quinn, this two-book set was based on the premise, "Two men say they’re the Duke of something. One of them must be wrong," inspired by a Dire Straits song.^[23] The events are concurrent and the plots are intertwined, with some scenes appearing in both books but from different perspectives.

Bevelstoke series[]

• The Secret Diaries of Miss Miranda Cheever (2007)
• What Happens in London (2009)
• Ten Things I Love About You (2010)

Smythe-Smith quartet[]

• Just Like Heaven (2011)
• A Night Like This (2012)
• The Sum of All Kisses (2013)
• The Secrets of Sir Richard Kenworthy (2015)

Rokesby series[]

• Because of Miss Bridgerton (2016)^[24]
• The Girl with the Make-Believe Husband (2017)^[25]
• The Other Miss Bridgerton (2018)
• First Comes Scandal (2020)

Lady Whistledown[]

The witty gossip columnist "Lady Whistledown" from the Bridgerton series ties together these two anthologies of interlinked novellas:

• "Thirty-Six Valentines" in The Further Observations of Lady Whistledown (2003, anthology with Suzanne Enoch, Karen Hawkins and )
• "The First Kiss" in Lady Whistledown Strikes Back (2004, anthology with Suzanne Enoch, Karen Hawkins and )

The Lady Most...[]

• The Lady Most Likely... (December 28, 2010 a novel in three parts with Connie Brockway and Eloisa James)
• The Lady Most Willing... (December 26, 2012 a novel in three parts with Connie Brockway and Eloisa James)

Others[]

• "Gretna Greene" in Scottish Brides (June 1, 1999 an anthology with Christina Dodd, Stephanie Laurens and Karen Ranney)
• ". . . and a Sixpence in Her Shoe" in Four Weddings and a Sixpence (December 27, 2016 an anthology with , and )

References[]

External links[]

• Official Julia Quinn Website
• Chapter excerpts and title list (Official publisher web page)