Georgette Heyer (16 August 1902 - 4 July 1974) was an English historical romance and detective fiction novelist. Her writing career began in 1921, when she turned a story for her younger brother into the novel The Black Moth. Heyer essentially established the historical romance genre and its subgenre Regency romance. Her Regencies were inspired by Jane Austen, but unlike Austen, who described the times in which she lived, Heyer was forced to include copious information about the period so that her readers would understand the setting.