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The oldest of ten children, she grew up in the small Appalachian village of Waverly, Ohio (named for Sir Walter Scott's WAVERLY NOVELS.) She was constantly writing plays for all of her siblings to perform. Her first rejection slip (from St. Anthony’s Messenger) arrived when she was five years old. Her grandfather typed and mailed her story, Pray for the Wanderer. He told her, “A rejection slip proves you are a writer. You wrote something and sent it out.” Twenty-five years later, she sold a revised version of that original short story to Catholic Digest. At Ohio University she majored in Creative Writing and Romance Languages, was Phi Beta Kappa, and editor of Sphere, the literary magazine. She won a scholarship to the Sorbonne in Paris. Her auto-biographical novel, UNE ANNEE A PARIS won first place from the Alliance Francaise. After France, she went to the Caribbean where she met and married Lennox Raphael, a Trinidadian writer. They traveled together through four continents. Their son Raphael was born in New York City. Maryanne taught at Ohio University, the New School for Social Research in New York City, and at the University of Hawaii. She was an editor at Prentice Hall and Woman’s Day Magazine. Her first book RUNAWAYS, AMERICA'S LOST YOUTH (co-author Jenifer Wolf) (Preface Anais Nin) was republished by the Authors Guild BACKINPRINT. After she was a Co-Worker of Mother Teresa’s for many years, her book MOTHER TERESA, CALLED TO LOVE was published. Then she published THE MAN WHO LOVED FUNERALS, ALEXANDRIA (co-author Patricia Walden), ALONG CAME A SPIDER, A PERSONAL LOOK AT MADNESS and ANAIS NIN, THE VOYAGE WITHIN. GARDEN OF HOPE, AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A MARRIAGE won first place as an unpublished memoir at the San Diego Book Awards Association. In October 2007 WHAT MOTHER TERESA TAUGHT ME was published by St. Anthony’s Messenger Press, the company that gave Maryanne her first rejection slip.