From her earliest days, Jennifer Leigh Youngblood has loved to read. "There have been many times when I would get interested in a book and stay up reading until the wee hours of the morning." She especially loves southern literature. Gone with the Wind, To Kill a Mockingbird, and Cold Sassy Tree are a few of her favorites. Jennifer grew up in a rural town in Alabama where "everybody knows your life story and your brother's life story, your sister's life story and so on." Growing up in such a small, close-knit community might seem confining to some, but not to Jennifer. She is proud of her southern heritage, believing that, "The oddities that make up the southern culture give it distinction."

Jennifer's love of writing began as a young teenager when she wrote stories for her high school English teacher to critique. She has written many poems and plays for personal and family use, but Livin' in High Cotton will be her first published work. Jennifer would have probably taken her writing more seriously at an early age were it not for her circumstance. She and her husband, Patrick, owned a monthly newspaper entitled The Senior Times where she worked as the editor. She remained the editor until 1994 when her first child was born, whereupon they sold their newspaper so that she could devote her full time to raising a family. In the midst of their hectic lives, the couple remodeled several homes as well.

In the spring of 2000, Patrick's job took the family to Ft. Worth, Texas. It was there (with no house to remodel) that Jennifer grew serious about her writing and began working on Livin' in High Cotton. Set in rural Alabama during the 1920's and 30's, Livin' In High Cotton required an extensive amount of research. This particular time was a turning point in southern history. The cotton industry, the livelihood that southerners had always depended on, was failing, and cotton was no longer king. Livin' in High Cotton explores how southerners faced and overcame these challenges. Jennifer says, "Writing Livin' in High Cotton gave me the opportunity to unearth and bring to life the legends of my childhood. I wanted to break down the ignorant, dejected, 'Hee Haw' stereotypes that are so commonly depicted. These were strong people who faced their challenges with courage and dignity. I have the highest admiration for these gritty, stubborn people who toiled their life away on a strip of land in a remote area of Alabama."

Jennifer's biggest challenge is balancing her writing with family life and church responsibilities. She does not have the liberty of secluding herself to a cabin in the woods for months on end. She, like the Victorian author Jane Austen, does most of her writing in the midst of her family. Some of her greatest inspiration has come while visiting museums with her children or running them to activities. For Jennifer, writing is a lot like putting together a puzzle. At the onset of every novel, she takes a while to get to know her characters, and then she lets them have free reign. "The characters I write about become real to me," she says. Jennifer and her mother, Sandra, write as a team. Jennifer loves working with her mother. She enjoys the feedback and appreciates the wealth of experience which Sandra has.

Jennifer is a native of Alabama. She has a B.A.in English from Brigham Young University-Hawaii, and also served as Miss BYU-Hawaii in 1989.