Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0cm; mso-para-margin-right:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0cm; line-height:115%; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;} Danielle de Valera has had a chequered career. She’s worked as a botanist, an editor, a cataloguer for the Queensland Department of Primary Industries Library and the John Oxley Library, and on the main floor of Arnott’s biscuit factory. Although the 1st draft of her 1st novel Some Kind of Romantic was placed 2nd in the Australia-wide Xavier Society Literary Award for an unpublished novel, she abandoned writing for 25 years to raise her children, whom she raised alone. Resuming writing in 1990, her short stories appeared in such diverse magazines as Penthouse, Aurealis and the Australian Women’s Weekly. With Louise Forster she won the Australia- and New Zealand-wide Emma Darcy Award for Romance Manuscript of the Year 2000 with Found: One Lover. Her first novel, Some Kind of Romantic, due out in November 2016, was shortlisted for the Byron Bay Writers’ Festival Unpublished Manuscript Award in 2011, and for the UK’s Impress Prize in 2012. A freelance manuscript assessor and fiction editor since 1992, she has won numerous awards for her gritty, streetwise short stories. MagnifiCat, a departure from this style, is her first published novel. It will be followed in 2014 by the The Children’s MagnifiCat. About that Name Danielle de Valera’s father claimed he was related to the controversial Irish politician Eamon de Valera on his mother’s side. But he told some tall tales in his time, and this is sure to be one of them. In searching for a name under which to write on the web,  she found that her birth name was replicated many times. what to do? Then she remembered her father’s story and chose that as her writing name.  

1993 Won the Ulitarra-Schaeffer pen short story competition.
1997 and 1998 Won the Byron Shire Echo short story competition.
1999 Won the Women's Short story competition.
2000 Won (with Lucy Forster) the Emma Darcy Award for Romance Manuscript of the Year 2000.
sometimes teaches ficton writing at Byron College.