Melissa Nathan
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Melissa Nathan | |
|---|---|
| Born | 13 June 1968 Hertfordshire, England |
| Died | 7 April 2006 (aged 37) |
| Education | University of Glamorgan University of Cardiff |
| Known for | Author |
| Spouses |
Andrew Saffron (m. 1995) |
| Children | 1 |
Melissa Jane Nathan (13 June 1968 – 7 April 2006) was a journalist for a decade, before she began writing comedy romance novels in 1998, including The Nanny (2003) which featured in The Sunday Times Top Ten.
She was born and raised in Hertfordshire, and educated at Haberdashers' Aske's School for Girls, Elstree. She graduated with a degree in communications from the Polytechnic of Wales (now University of Glamorgan) in 1989 after which she took a post-graduate course in journalism at the University of Cardiff.[1]
Career
For the first ten years of her career she was sub-editor for Prima Magazine, feature writer for Women's Weekly and contributor to The Jewish Chronicle.[2]
When working on Persuading Annie (2001), Nathan was diagnosed with breast cancer. She had no time for most journalism written by cancer sufferers: "self-indulgent dirges without a helpline in sight", as she described them; she tried to joke about cancer's unoriginality in her column in The Jewish Chronicle and then added:
"That was what you call laughing in adversity. It's what makes people smile mistily at me, as if I'm fading in front of their very eyes while telling knock-knock jokes. What they don't know is that I have daydreams about being the oldest person at their funeral."[3]
Ironically, the characters in Nathan's first book, Pride, Prejudice and Jasmin Field, were starring in a play version of Pride and Prejudice that benefitted breast cancer research. The book was written prior to Nathan knowing about her own future diagnosis with the disease.[4]
