Helen Bianchin
Author of Purchased: His Perfect Wife
About the Author
Series
Works by Helen Bianchin
Christmas Affairs (The Seduction Season / A Miracle on Christmas Eve / Yuletide Reunion) (1998) — Contributor — 37 copies
Coming Home for Christmas (A Christmas Marriage Ultimatum / The Millionaire's Christmas Wish / A Prince for Christmas) (2003) — Contributor — 17 copies
Tall, Dark and Sexy (The Spaniard's Baby Bargain / A Very Single Woman / The Australian Tycoon's Proposal) (2008) 5 copies
A Bundle of Brides (The Billion-Dollar Bride / The Disobedient Bride / The Sheikh's Captive Bride) (2007) 4 copies
Bought Brides (The Marriage Deal / The Greek's Bought Wife / Purchased by the Billionaire) (2009) 3 copies
Romance Treasury: Avenging Angel / Sown in the Wind / Cruise to a Wedding (1985) — Contributor — 2 copies
Happy Christmas Love Mills & Boon. Helen Bianchin ... [Et Al.] (Mills & Boon Special Releases) (2010) 2 copies
Latin Affairs (The Sicilian's Passion / In the Spaniard's Bed / The Italian Marriage) (2006) 2 copies
Weddings Down Under (An Ideal Marriage? / Georgia and the Tycoon / Outback Bride) (2001) — Contributor — 2 copies
Marriage on Trial 1 copy
Harlequin Presents 4 pack: Marriage: To Claim His Twins / Kat and the Dare-Devil Spaniard / The Andreou Marriage… (2010) 1 copy
The Italian's Ruthless Marriage Command [and] The Greek Tycoon's Blackmailed Mistress — Author — 1 copy
Box Set Harlequin Premiere Editions 1-12 (12-in-1) — Contributor — 1 copy
Latin Lovers bundle (6 books) : Duarte's Child ~ In the Spaniard's Bed ~ South American's Wife ~… (2008) 1 copy
Romance Treasury: Bewildered Haven / The Tartan Ribbon / The Slender Thread (1984) — Contributor — 1 copy
Alexei's Passionate Revenge | Tycoon's Delicious Debt — Author — 1 copy
Hot Nights With The Italian 1 copy
Vain sinua varten — Author — 1 copy
Associated Works
Tagged
Common Knowledge
- Birthdate
- 20th Century
- Gender
- female
- Nationality
- New Zealand (birth)
- Birthplace
- New Zealand
- Places of residence
- Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
Cairns, Queensland, Australia
Treviso, Italy - Occupations
- novelist
typist - Awards and honors
- Romance Writers of Australia Hall of Fame (2012)
- Short biography
- Helen was born on February 20 in New Zealand, where she grew up, an only child possessed by a vivid imagination and a love for reading. She wrote stories for amusement in her early teenage years, and when she left leaving school, she took a secretarial job at a father-and-son legal firm.
At age twenty-one Helen joined a girlfriend and embarked on a working holiday in Australia, travelling via cruise ship from Auckland to Melbourne. Alas, no shipboard romance, as she spent all four days in her cabin suffering from sea-sickness! After fifteen months working in Melbourne, Helen and her friend bought a vehicle and took three months to drive the length and breadth of Australia, choosing to work in Cairns in order to fund the final leg of our journey to Sydney.
It was in Cairns that Helen met her future husband, Danilo Bianchin, an Italian immigrant from Treviso. He was a tobacco sharefarmer from the tobacco farming community of Mareeba. His English was pitiful, and her command of Italian was nil. Six months later they married, and Helen was flung into cooking for up to nine tobacco pickers, stringing tobacco, feeding 200 chickens, a few turkeys, ducks... plus killing, cleaning and cooking the same! Her knowledge of Italian improved, and there were hilarious moments in retrospect. Some of what she endured was cooking on a wood-burning stove, having no running hot water, a primitive shower and toilet facilities, washing uniforms for two soccer teams during the soccer season... floods, horrendous hailstone damage to tobacco crops, hardship, and the stillbirth of their first child. Then, to their joy, Helen's daughter, Lucia, was born. Three years later the couple returned to New Zealand, where they settled for sixteen years. During those early years, they added two sons, Angelo and Peter, to the family.
With multiple anecdotes of farm life in an Italian community to friends, the idea of writing a book occurred. A romance, set on a tobacco farm in Australia's far north, Queensland, featuring an Italian hero. Helen says, "the background was authentic, believe me!" However the hero was rich and owned the farm artistic license! It took her a year to complete a passable manuscript, typed on a portable typewriter at the dining room table. That first effort was deemed too short with insufficient detail. Helen rewrote it. This time it was considered too long with too much extraneous detail. She revised, then sent it to London. Four months later she received a telegram from Alan Boon (Mills & Boon) to say they intended to publish and a contract would be sent in the mail. It was the most wonderful news!
Helen wrote ten more books while living in New Zealand, then in 1981, her family resettled in Australia, on Queensland's Gold Coast. She has since published twenty-five more books. Today, with computer technology, the mechanics of writing are much easier. However, the writing process doesn't change. Helen says that she's having a good day if she can achieve 5 good pages, which she is likely to change, edit and rewrite the following day.
She loves creating characters, giving them life and providing a situation where their emotions are tested and love wins out. For her, the greatest praise is for a reader to say they couldn't put the book down... then Helen knows that she has achieved what she set out to do -- "create a moving enjoyable story which holds the reader entertained from beginning to end."
Helen's hobbies are tennis, table-tennis, judo, reading. She loves movies, and leads an active social life.
Members
Discussions
Harlequin from 1990s? Arranged marriage scenario in Name that Book (May 2016)
Romance - Mills & Boon/Harlequin in Name that Book (July 2015)
Reviews
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Statistics
- Works
- 126
- Also by
- 16
- Members
- 1,782
- Popularity
- #14,448
- Rating
- 2.9
- Reviews
- 22
- ISBNs
- 583
- Languages
- 12
- Favorited
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