In 1975 Jilly Cooper began to write the series of 'permissive' romances, based on long magazine stories she had published earlier and these became Emily, Bella, Imogen, Prudence, Harriet and Octavia – her first fiction – in book form. In 1993 she published Araminta's Wedding a witty novella of English country life inspired by the paintings of Sue McCartney-Snape.

Her first big novel, Riders was published in 1985 and went straight to number 1 in the best-sellers lists, as did Rivals published in 1988. Polo, which was published in 1991, was the highest selling hardback novel of the year. The Man Who Made Husbands Jealous, which was published in April of 1993 went straight into the number 1 position too and remained there for eight weeks. All of these books have sold well over 1 million copies each in their British editions.

Riders was her first novel to be adapted for a major two-part mini-series for television. It achieved an astounding 9 million viewers for the first episode and 15 million for the second.

In April 1996 Jilly Cooper’s twelfth novel AppassionataSCORE!Pandora. In 1998 she received a Lifetime Achievement Award at the British Book Awards.

Jilly Cooper's books have sold over 11 million copies in the UK alone. Her books have been translated into Dutch, French, Italian, Spanish, German, Greek, Japanese, Norwegian, Swedish, Polish, Russian, Finnish and Lithuanian as well as being published in The United States.

One of her proudest achievements is that she has been a member of The National Canine Defence League for the last fifteen years.

Jilly's new novel, Wicked! – A Tale of Two Schools was published in May 2006.