Stephenie Meyer lives in Phoenix Arizona with her husband and three young sons. She graduated from Brigham Young University with a degree in English literature.
Meyer was named USA Today's "Author of the Year" in 2008. She was also the biggest selling author of the year, having sold over 29 million books in 2008 alone, with Twilight being the best selling book of the year.
Meyer was ranked #49 on Time magazine's list of the 100 Most Influential People in 2008, and was also included in the Forbes Celebrity 100 list of the world's most powerful celebrities in 2009, entering at #26 with annual earnings exceeding $50 million.
Meyer's life changed dramatically on June 2, 2003. The stay-at-home mother of three young sons woke up from a dream featuring seemingly real characters that she could not get out of her head.
Meyer invented the plot during the day through swim lessons and potty training, and wrote it out late at night when the house was quiet. Three months later she finished her first novel, Twilight. Meyer had never written even a short story before Twilight.
The dream was about a human girl, and a vampire who was in love with her but thirsted for her blood. Meyer wrote the transcript of what is now Chapter 13 of the book.
Following the success of Twilight (2005), Meyer expanded the story into a series with three more books: New Moon (2006), Eclipse (2007), and Breaking Dawn (2008). In its first week after publication, the first sequel, New Moon, debuted at #5 on the New York Times Best Seller List for Children's Chapter Books, and in its second week rose to the #1 position, where it remained for following weeks.
In August, 2009 USA Today revealed that Meyer broke JK Rowling's record on the their bestseller list.
Upon the completion of the fourth entry in the series, Meyer indicated that Breaking Dawn would be the final novel to be told from Bella Swan's perspective.
Midnight Sun was to be a companion novel to the series. It would be a retelling of the events of the novel Twilight, but from the perspective of Edward Cullen (as opposed to Bella Swan).
Meyer had hoped to have Midnight Sun published some time shortly after the release of Breaking Dawn, but after an online leak of a rough draft of its first 12 chapters, Meyer chose to delay the project indefinitely.
In addition, since Meyer has decided to pursue non-Twilight related books as a result of the leak, she made the rough chapters of "Midnight Sun" available on her website
After Twilight she released the book The Host. The idea for The Host originated on a trip from Phoenix to Salt Lake City. Bored, Meyer made up stories to entertain herself, and was halfway through outlining the story of The Host in her head before realizing what she had created.
The character of Ian was originally meant to play an extremely small role. As a matter of fact, Meyer had no plans for a romance between Ian and Wanderer until Jared "got on [her] last nerve", and Ian "refused to be ignored".
The title "The Host" comes from the perspective of the main character, Wanderer, because her "host" Melanie forever changes the way she sees the world.
The novel introduces an alien race, called souls, who take over Earth and its inhabitants. The book describes one soul's predicament when the mind of its human host refuses to cooperate with her takeover. The Host was released on May 6, 2008 with an initial print run of 750,000 copies.
The prologue and the fourth chapter of the book can be found on Meyer's official website.
In an interview with Vogue Magazine, Meyer stated that body image was a major aspect of her novel. She noted that she is "very critical" of her body, but not others'. In The Host, she tried to convey "what a gift it is to just have a body, and really love it." This is something most humans would take for granted before being captured, and something that Melanie is all-too aware of once she loses control of her body.
