Born and raised in North Dakota, Melanie Nilles continues to call the state home.  Her interest in science fiction and fantasy was planted as a child through the rough times of shuffling between divorced parents, when she would escape through imaginary play with two brothers and childhood friends.  Through the years, she fed her imagination with books and movies and knew from a young age that she wanted to put her own ideas into words.

After her mother remarried and moved her and her brothers to their stepfamily's farm, Melanie turned to horses as her escape.  Chasing cows became a way of life on the open prairie, which she grew to love.  As her interest in horses expanded, she started showing in local 4-H shows and learned all she could about equine behavior.  However, she never lost her interest in the magnificent worlds of science fiction and fantasy, and her horse craze fed her imagination.

As editor of her high school paper, she had a taste of the writing world, but it was never enough.  In college, she started her first novels.  Though they were never published, she considers them a practice step towards reaching her dream of becoming an author.  After transferring to the University of West Florida for a year, she moved back to her home state, where she earned her Bachelor of Science from NDSU in Fargo, North Dakota.  Despite returning, she looks back on her time in Pensacola with fondness and gratitude for the experience and the people who helped her.

The fun wouldn't last, however.  Before her last year of college, tragedy struck her life with the death of her brother, Matt.  "He was a huge fan of The Lord of the Rings and tried to get me to read the books when we were young, but I never did.  He also was very protective of me, considering he was my 'little' brother."  His death came a few weeks after she returned from a hiatus of three years with no horses by buying a young Paint filly.  "Star pulled me through that year, along with knowing that Matt wouldn't want me to quit school when I was so close to the end."  After finishing school, with nothing keeping her in Fargo, she returned to Bismarck,where she could live and work close to her family.

Within a couple years, she met Allen Nilles online.  "The first time we talked on the phone, I thought he was boring and didn't answer any more calls.  Six months later, we met again online and I didn't recognize his handle but he knew mine.  He made sure to remind me, but we agreed to be friends.  However, when I met him the first time, I knew there was something there."  After only ten months as a couple, Allen proposed.  One year later, on May 18, 2002, they were married.  "The scary thing is that Allen is identical in his interests to Matt, so I know my brother had something to do with bringing us together."  (You can read more at this blog post.)

Since then, her husband pushed her to read The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit.  He also inspired her writing of the Legend of the White Dragon series with his repertoire of experience, which includes everything from Dungeons & Dragons RPGing to his vast library of fantasy books featuring dragons.  Both Allen and Melanie share an interest in dragons, fantasy, and science fiction, evident by their collections of Pocket Dragons, movies, and books.

Melanie continues with her love of horses, an interest her husband doesn't share.  She currently owns a young warmblood she hopes to show as a dressage and hunter prospect and will train him herself, as she has with other horses she previously owned.  "Star moved on to a good family, and I've moved on to other interests she couldn't support; but she'll always be the horse that carried me through the hardest part of my life...Now is the right time for Beau in my life."

She continues to write when she can around a schedule that includes time for her two children, husband, horse, and cats. But she also squeezes in time online on her blogs and forums.  To find out what she's doing currently, visit her main blog at www.melanienilles.com/blog1 and her more personal blog at starlet97.livejournal.com.