In her hometown (population: 4,900), locals say she is rarely seen without the company of one of her three sons - Gabe, 11, Seth, eight, and Eli, six - or Christian, her husband of 15 years.Ĭave Creek is a slightly run-down old frontier town which now serves as a tourist spot for travellers driving through the sun-scorched Sonoran Desert on their way to the Grand Canyon. This remarkable story is made even more so by Meyer's apparently ordinary lifestyle. When the 498-page manuscript was finished, she was going to put it in a drawer and forget about it but, at her sister's urging, sent it to several publishers.Ī canny editor pulled the book from a pile on her desk and, having read it on a plane, was so entranced by the story that Meyer was offered a three-book deal worth £500,000 on the spot. Meyer often worked all night and then shared each chapter with her elder sister, Emily. Meyer spent the next three months writing Twilight, in which vampire Edward falls for the chaste heroine Bella Swan. Yet little is known about the slightly plump brunette.ĭeadly kiss: British actor Robert Pattinson stars as a vampire with Kristen Stewart in the new Twilight film, New Moon To date, Meyer, a 35-year-old Mormon who started writing only five years ago, is said to have amassed a fortune of more than £50million. There seems little doubt that the sequel, New Moon, will set new records when it is released next week.

Last year Meyer sold an astonishing 27million books in 37 countries - eclipsing even the Harry Potter series - and when a film version of Twilight was released starring British heart-throb Robert Pattinson as vampire Edward Cullen, it made more than £200million worldwide. Here, in the remote town of Cave Creek, Arizona, is where Stephenie Meyer chooses to live, in a house she has shared with her husband and three children for the past decade.Ī cursory glance at the bestseller lists on both sides of the Atlantic shows Meyer is, as Time magazine declared, 'the publishing phenomenon of the new century'.Īt various points this year, all five of her published books - four in the hugely successful Twilight series of vampire romance novels and one work of adult science-fiction - have been in the Top 10 in both Britain and the United States.

Only a high-tech camera and newly installed metal gates give some hint of the occupant's desire for privacy. Set down a dusty dirt trail, the four-bedroom property blends seamlessly into the desert landscape - low and sand-coloured with just a few cacti for decoration. For a woman who has sold more than 85 million books and has been hailed as the new J.

Stephenie meyer author