Jennifer Young was born in a small textile town in North Carolina, USA, and moved to the UK in 2001. She has since completed a PhD and gained British citizenship. Her degrees are from the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill, Cardiff University and the University of Southampton. She is the Dean of the Faculty of Business & Design and Associate Professor of Creative Writing at Falmouth University. She has been a judge for the Comedy Women in Print prize since its debut year. Jennifer lives in Cornwall with her daughter.

Her novel Cold Crash won the Cinnamon Press Debut Novel Prize.