Becoming a writer after a midlife reassessment at forty, Haywood Smith--also known as Anne--has lived in Buford for 37 years. In the past 13 years, she has published six critically acclaimed romance novels about "strong women, men who are men, positive resolutions, and accurate history" set in England and Scotland that received numerous national awards and nominations.

After a difficult divorce, she switched to writing funny, uplifting women's fiction: QUEEN BEE OF MIMOSA BRANCH was featured by Southern Living, and THE RED HAT CLUB made the NY Times Best Seller Print List. THE RED HAT CLUB RIDES AGAIN debuted at #26 on the New York Times List and USA Today's Top Fifty, and her 2008 novel, WEDDING BELLES, is the third book of her Red Hat Club Trilogy, based on Jenny Joseph's poem, "Warning".

Haywood's humorous nonfiction handbook, THE 12 SACRED TRADITIONS OF MAGNIFICENT MOTHERS-IN-LAW, became available from Belle Books in 2009, and in September of that year, LADIES OF THE LAKE was published by St. Martins Press.

Her newest novel, WAKING UP IN DIXIE, is a fun twist on the male midlife crisis and revisits small-town Georgia. Haywood is currently working on the second of a two-book contract with St. Martins Press for more humorous women's fiction.

"Life gives you grief for free," Haywood says, "but if you read one of my books, you're going to laugh and feel good."