She has achieved sales of over fourteen million in the UK alone and her tenth novel, The Know, spent seven weeks on The Sunday Times hardback best-sellers list.
Eilidh Martina Cole was born 30 March 1959, in Essex, England, to Irish Catholic parents, and was the youngest of five children.
Her mother was a psychiatric nurse from Glasnevin, County Dublin and her father was a merchant seaman from Cork City.
She was expelled from her convent school aged 15 after allegedly being caught reading a Harold Robbins novel.
[1] Prior to her literary success, Cole had a variety of low-paid jobs, including working as a cleaner, a wine waitress, an agency nurse and a supermarket shelf-stacker.
[1] Cole's breakthrough came in 1991, when her manuscript for Dangerous Lady was accepted by the literary agent Darley Anderson and sold for a record £150,000.
[8] In 2008 Martina Cole presented a drama documentary series on ITV3 called Martina Cole's Lady Killers, which told the story of six of history's most notorious female serial killers, including Myra Hindley, Beverly Allitt and Rose West.
This focused on the role of girls in these gangs, which have been responsible for crimes ranging from drug dealing and car theft to robbery and murder.
Along with TV executive producer, Barry Ryan, Cole co-owns the film and television production company "2 Queens".