About Sophie

Official Bio

Called a “writing machine” by the New York Times and a “master storyteller” by the Midwest Book Review, Sophie Littlefield has written dozens of novels for adults and teens under her own name and the pen name Sofia Grant. She has won Anthony and RT Book Awards and been shortlisted for Edgar®, Barry, Crimespree, Macavity, and Goodreads Choice Awards.
 

More about Sophie

Until ten years ago, I was a busy suburban mom with a house to keep up and two kids to raise…and a secret: I wanted to write a book.

I had no formal training, but I had something even better—a life spent reading books of all kinds. I had no particular favorite genre; my bedside table was crammed with mysteries and romances and literary novels and biographies and tales of adventure and parenting books and gardening books and self-help books and cookbooks and books about interior design and travel books and…well, you get the picture. There was always a book in my purse, a book in my gym bag, a stack of books in the car, books in the bathroom and the garage and left out in the rain in the back yard and forgotten in suitcases and lost under piles of laundry. I was (and am) never, ever, without something to read.

I started the way all writers must—with a blank page and a sense of trepidation. But I kept at it, and once I had a few short stories under my belt, I took a tip from an author acquaintance and joined Romance Writers of America. I made some friends (I’m still close to some of the women I met at my first meeting) and gathered the courage to write my first novel. Thank heavens I didn’t know how very terrible it was, or I might never have had the audacity to write the next one…and the one after that, and the one after that, all the while learning how to write a query letter and submit my novel to agents and editors and, most importantly, how to pick myself up and try again after yet another rejection.

I also started to build the community that sustains me to this day. I’ve been so lucky to surround myself by colleagues who are also friends. I met my web designer at the first conference I ever attended. I’m still in touch with many of the editors, publicists and other industry folks I met along the way.

In all, I wrote nine novels before I found my wonderful agent, Barbara Poelle. We’ve been together ever since 2007, and she has sold over twenty of my novels.

A few other things happened during those years. I got divorced, my kids grew up, and I said goodbye to the suburbs and moved to Oakland, California, where I live in an adorable apartment a few blocks from the best bagels on the West coast, two craft beer breweries, three bookstores (including a comic book shop), an old-fashioned market with an old-fashioned butcher, a car dealership-turned-restaurant and a library-turned-restaurant. Oh, and the BEST taco truck in town. I’m very happy knowing I’ll never perish of thirst, hunger, or the lack of something to read.

When I’m not writing or reading, I also make time to explore diners and dive bars with my friends, visit my grown-up kids, and hike and camp.