Connie Briscoe: best-selling author and novelist

AS a young girl, she had difficulty hearing. In college, the problem worsened. By the time she reached her 30s, she was nearly deaf. But now, after successful cochlear-implant surgery which restored 80 percent of her hearing, Connie Briscoe, the 52-year-old best-selling author, wife and mother of two, can hear the melodious sounds of success ringing loud and true.

"The onset [of the hearing loss] was very gradual at first," she says, "so I could make small adjustments, like sitting closer to my professors, reading lips and eventually, wearing a hearing aid."

But then, her hearing took an unexpected turn for the worst. "I went from about 30 percent hearing loss to 80 percent hearing loss," she recalls. "That's when I decided to take a stab at writing that novel I had always dreamed about. I saw writing as something I could do and be successful at regardless of how little hearing I had. That's why I sometimes think that losing my hearing was one of the best things that ever happened to me.

"I guess I've always been a 'glass is half full' kind of person," she continues. "No matter how tough things get, you can make them better. I have my parents to thank for that."

Now, the author of five best-selling novels, including Sisters and Lovers, Big Girls Don't Cry, A Long Way From Home, P.G. County and its sequel Can't Get Enough, Briscoe will embark on her first book tour this year without an interpreter. Next, she'll pen a novelette (alongside Anita Bunkley and Lolita Files) and later focus on her first nonfiction project.

Still, the full-time mom contends that the best success is reaping the rewards of parenting the two children that she and her husband, Rod, adopted two years ago, including a daughter who was born deaf. But thanks to Briscoe's success with the cochlear implant, her daughter also underwent the surgery recently, and is now enjoying a world she never knew--a world with sound.

"We want our daughter to have dreams and ambitions and the best possible chance of reaching them. So, when she looks at me with expressions of doubt, I want to be able to tell her, 'yes, you can,' just as my mother told me," says Briscoe. "There are so many rewards in seeing the progress of my children, especially when they have so many needs. They bring an entirely new and welcome dimension to our lives. They enrich our lives beyond compare."