Dubbed ‘Queen of the Underworld’, Jessie Keane is of Romany gypsy stock. She was born rich, in the back of her gran’s barrel top wagon, and her family thrived until their firm crashed into bankruptcy and became poor. Her father died when she was a teenager and she fled to London to escape grim reality, finding there a lifelong fascination with the criminal underworld and the teeming life of the city.

Twice divorced and living in a freezing council flat, she decided to pursue her childhood aim to become a writer. She sold her wedding dress to buy a typewriter and penned her first Annie Carter book, Dirty Game. Within weeks of sending it out to agents, she had a three book deal for a six figure sum and when Dirty Game was published it shot straight to No. 1 in the Heatseekers chart.

Dirty Game was followed by five more Annie Carter books, all Sunday Times bestsellers, then Ruby Darke arrived in Nameless, Lawless and The Edge. Jessie’s stand-alone novels include Jail Bird, The Make, Dangerous, Fearless, The Knock and The Manor.

Now Jessie lives in a quiet village in Hampshire with Cliff, her partner. Her latest book Dead Heat was published in February 2024.