M. E. Braddon

Mary Elizabeth Braddon was born on 4 October 1835 in Soho, London, the youngest of three children. In 1840 her mother, Fanny, left her father, Henry Braddon, because of his infidelities. Her brother Edward went to India and later to Australia, where he became Premier of Tasmania. In 1852 Mary and her mother moved to the English provinces, and she went on the stage to support them both.

From 1852 to 1860 she toured as an actress, mostly in minor parts, until a lack of leading roles and mixed reviews turned her towards writing novels. In 1861 she met John Maxwell, a publisher of periodicals, and moved in with him, although he was already married. They could only marry in 1874, after his wife's death. Braddon was stepmother to his five children and had six more with him. She founded the magazine Belgravia in 1866.

Braddon wrote more than eighty novels. Lady Audley's Secret (1862), the book on this site, began as a serial in 1861 in Robin Goodfellow, a magazine owned by Maxwell. As a novel it sold through nine editions in its first year and has stayed in print ever since. It is seen as one of the founding examples of sensation fiction, and Braddon urged reviewers not to give away her stories' secrets. She also wrote ghost stories and historical fiction.

She died on 4 February 1915 in Richmond, then in Surrey, and is buried in Richmond Cemetery. Her son William Babington Maxwell also became a novelist.

Sources: wikipedia.org