[1] Caroline Emily Sharp was born in 1844[2] in London to a well-off family who began her education by sending her to Paris at the age of six to learn French.

At some time she and two of her brothers started a publication called the City Advertiser but it was discontinued after six months.

[1] At her husband's instigation she started to write, achieving moderate success with her first novel, Juliette's Guardian, which was published in a magazine[1] and then as a book in 1877.

In 1891 she contributed a chapter to the unusual novel The Fate of Fenella, a three-volume novel created without discussion by twelve male and twelve female writers, including Bram Stoker and Arthur Conan Doyle.

[3] Allen's book told of Herminia Barton, a woman who opted for "free love" because she refused to be a slave to any man.