I know it's a cliché, but it was a lifelong dream of mine to see my name as a byline for Cosmo or More! So, to be here, heading the wonderful team at Romance Matters is an actual dream come true.

Ever since I was old enough to read through Pony Mag, I loved the snippets of info nestled amongst glossy pictures of piebalds and palominos. As I grew, and my interests changed from ponies to ponytails, the magazines changed with me. I would devour articles in Just Seventeen and even now I'm an adult, I love getting lost in the pages of Country Life, Good Housekeeping, and Women and Home, to name but a few.

As a shy and quiet fifteen-year-old, I wrote countless letters to the editors of Cosmopolitan asking them for work experience and was eventually offered the chance to spend a day with the fashion team. Though probably not the best way to go about it, my persistence worked! And I have worked in magazines, in one form or another, ever since.

I had visions of glass-walled offices and takeaway cups of coffee fuelling meetings where I'd get to trial loads of wonderful skincare. Fast forward a couple of decades and, in actuality, I write alone at my desk in my bedroom, in trousers that can barely pass as more than PJs, but I still love it!

In 2019, I took my first steps writing romance (coming from a horror and crime screenwriting background!), and it wasn’t long before I found a home within the Romantic Novelists’ Association – the friendliest organisation I’ve ever been lucky to be a part of.

Going through the New Writers’ Scheme was invaluable, and in 2020, during the Virtual RNA Conference, I secured my literary agent – something I’ll always be grateful for. I owe so much to this amazing organisation, and I can’t wait to give a little back through Romance Matters.

When I’m not wrangling magazine deadlines, I’m busy being a single mum, looking after my two chaos-loving cats, and wrapping up warm to head to the stables to see our horse. Somewhere in between, I squeeze in writing too. I write uplifting contemporary romance under my own name, Kate Galloway, and steamy billionaire romance as Katie Evergreen.

Beyond my passion for writing, I'm also an HCPC-registered occupational therapist. I made the decision to quit my role as a consultant in social care just last July, but working in the job for nearly ten years has given me a deep appreciation for the relationship between creativity and wellbeing. And this inspired me to introduce The Write Balance, a new column dedicated to supporting writers in finding harmony between their craft and their mental health. Writing can be exhilarating, but it can also be isolating and brutal, and I’m eager to explore how we can nurture our creativity while taking care of ourselves.

Writing has been the one constant in my life – whether it was firing off letters to magazines as a teenager, pouring my heart into writing romance, or now, stepping into the role of editor-in-chief for Romance Matters. I’m so excited to bring my love for the genre and the RNA to these pages and champion the stories, writers, and readers that make romance the best place to be.