Kathleen Erin Hogg was born on June 3, 1939 in Alexandria, Louisiana, USA. She was the youngest of eight children of Charles Wingrove Hogg, a disabled World War I veteran, and his wife, Gladys Coker. As a child, she devoured fairy tales, later she relished creating her own stories, and by age six was telling herself stories at night to help fall asleep. When she was only twelve, her father died suddenly, leaving her to be raised by her mother and older sisters. Kathleen would later remark that, "every single one of us had minds of our own even then; I was no exception. I suppose that carried over into my creations of heroines who weren't weak-willed."
At the age of sixteen, Kathleen met twenty-one years old U.S. Air Force Second Lieutenant Ross Eugene Woodiwiss at a dance for servicemen. They eloped a year later, and married on July 20, 1956. She continued in the school locally and graduated in 1957. In 1960, they had their first son Sean Alan, who was born in Alexandria. Her husband's military career led them to live in Japan, where they had their second and middle son, Dorren James in Tachikawa on August 8, 1962. Kathleen worked part-time as a fashion model for an American-owned modeling agency. She enjoyed fashion modeling, and later designing and creating many of her own gowns and costumes for numerous officer’s club functions that she attended with her husband. After three and a half years in Japan, the family moved to Topeka, Kansas. During these years, she attempted to begin a novel several times, but each time stopped in frustration at the slow pace of writing a novel longhand. In 1968, finally the family instaled in Minnesota, where they had a large home on 55 acres (220,000 m2). They had their three and late son Heath Alexander, on 1970 in Minneapolis. Kathleen was an accomplished horse rider, who was the first rider/driver to have won both Amateur Pleasure Grand Championships with the same horse in the history of the Morgan Grand National Horse Show.
After buying her husband an electric typewriter for a Christmas present, she appropriated the machine to begin her novel in earnest. Kathleen's first manuscript, was rejected by agents and hardcover publishers as being too long at 600 pages. Rather than follow the advice of the rejection letters and rewrite the novel, she instead submitted it to paperback publishers. The first publisher on her list, Avon, quickly purchased the novel. Legendary editor Nancy Coffey provided a $1500 advance and arranged for an initial 500,000 print run. "The Flame and the Flower" was revolutionary, featuring an epic historical romance with a strong heroine and actual sex scenes. This novel, published in 1972, sold over 2.3 million copies in its first four years of publication and is credited with spawning the modern romance genre, becoming the first romance novel "to follow the principals into the bedroom." The success of this novel prompted a new style of writing romance, concentrating primarily on historical fiction tracking the monogamous relationship between helpless heroines and the hero who rescued her, even if he had been the one to place her in danger. Kathleen sayd whose heroines always stay faithful to their seducers: "We like to fantasize about what we believe in, and I do believe in commitment." The romance novels which followed in her example featured longer plots, more controversial situations and characters, and more intimate and steamy sex scenes. Kathleen published only twelve romance novels and two novellas in thirty-three years, but her books are best-sellers with over thirty-six million copies in print. She often took four to five years to write a single novel. In some cases, she attributed the lag in publication time to personal and health issues, while in others she confessed to having suffered burnout and needing a rest to recover her interest in writing.
Kathleen had a direct impact on the career of fellow novelist LaVyrle Spencer. Soon after finding her own success, she read a manuscript written by LaVyrle, who had yet to earn a publishing contract. Kathleen promptly mailed LaVyrle's novel to her own editor at Avon, and the editor purchased the novel, The Fulfillment. In addition, many modern romance novelists cite Kathleen E. Woodiwiss's books as their inspiration to write, like Virginia Henley, Betina Krahn, Susan Elizabeth Phillips, Kate Hoffmann and Julia Quinn.
After her husband's death in 1996, Kathleen moved back to Louisiana, visiting frecuently her family in Minessota. On June 17, 2007, her son Dorren James Woodiwiss died unexpectedly, few days before her, who died at 68, on July 6, 2007 after a long and courageous battle with cancer at Fairview Northland Regional Hospital in Princeton.
