Monte spent most of her professional life toiling in the fields of accounting as a Certified Public Accountant. In the meantime, she studied literature, practiced writing, studied creative writing, and continued writing. Eventually, she earned a Ph.D. in English from Arizona State University.

Decades of studying the World War I era and eight winters spent living at the French Riviera led to the story in Monte Carlo Masquerades. Masquerades is her first published novel. A second novel, Abram’s Sons, set in a World War I battlefield, is on the way.