Brenda Jackson, New York Times and USA Today Bestselling author was born in Jacksonville, Florida. She earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Business Administration from Jacksonville University and worked in management for State Farm Insurance where retired after thirty-seven years. She married her high school sweetheart, Gerald, forty-one years ago and they have two sons, Gerald Jr. and Brandon, ages thirty-five and thirty-three, respectively.
Her professional writing career began in 1995 with the release of her first book, Tonight and Forever. Since then she has written over 95 titles, which includes a made-for-television movie by BET, One Special Moment. She has received numerous national and literary awards and has made many trail-blazing accomplishments, which includes being the first African-American author to make the New York Times Bestseller’s List and the USA Today's Bestseller's List in the romance genre.
She was a 2012 NAACP Image Award Nominee for Outstanding Literary Fiction for her book, A Silken Thread, and was recently named Romance Writers of America’s Nora Robert’s Lifetime Achievement Award recipient for 2012.
She has been featured in several magazines including Essence, Sister-2-Sister, Today’s Black Woman, Ebony, Romantic Times, Good Housekeeping, Woman’s Day and Cosmopolitan.
Inspired by her love of romance and dedication to her numerous readers, Brenda formed her own publishing company, the Madaris Publishing Company. She is proud of her national book club – the Brenda Jackson Book Club – that has a membership of over 2,500 readers. Brenda also joins her readers every two years for a Madaris/Westmoreland family reunion cruise to various destinations.
One of Brenda’s entities, Madaris Entertainment, has joined forces with her son Gerald’s production company, Five Alive Films, to bring viewers the best in romantic movies based on Brenda’s award winning books. Brenda has started work on another movie based on her book, A Silken Thread. Production will begin later this year.
She added a director’s hat to her list of accomplishment with her first movie titled, Truly Everlasting. It was a huge success and has been picked up by Warner Brothers and was released to stores nationwide on May 15, 2012. For more information visit, Truly Everlasting.
She has received awards for her community service from the AKA Sorority, the Delta Sorority, the Zeta Sorority and the Clara White Mission.
A staunch supporter of higher education, she established the Josiephine Threatt Scholarship Foundation at Florida Memorial University in Miami, in honor of her grandmother. She has given over a $150,000.00 to this scholarship foundation at FMU to grant college educations to students who might not be able to afford one.
A listing of her books can be found on her website – Brenda Jackson.
Visit her FaceBook Fan Page, and on Twitter.
ACRA meets on the 4th Saturday of each month at the
Southeast Regional Library, 10599 Deerwood Park Blvd, Jacksonville, FL. Phone
(904)-996-0325. Bring your lunch and socialize from noon-12:30, followed by a
workshop.
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