Smart Bitches Trashy Books | All of the romance, none of the bullshit.

1. You are often discussed on our site among the company of “writers who do romance brilliantly but very differently.” Do you think you have a unique view of romance?

Thanks for the compliment!  I think the driving force behind my books is not so much my view of romance as it it my penchant to become easily bored.  So I tend to create characters that have some odd quirks, I guess, or to put a hero and heroine together who don’t have much in common.  Then it’s a challenge to figure out what they might give one another in an emotional sense.  Once I have a challenge, then I can stay interested in what happens.

2. New book! Details! Please!

After I finished SHADOWHEART, long before it was on the shelves and there was any controversy among readers about it, I’d already decided that I wanted to do a much lighter book this time. So I’ve pulled a complete 180--if books have family ties, the THE LUCKY ONE is a first cousin to MIDSUMMER MOON and a very distant relation of SHADOWHEART.  I wanted to revisit some of the character styles that I’ve enjoyed in the past--what I think of as “hedgehog humor.” It’s a regency setting.  The hero is a feckless French emigre and the heroine is a wallflower who’s been jilted three times. Her greatest desire is to win the silver cup at the agricultural fair with her gigantic prize bull, Hubert. This doesn’t turn out to be quite a simple as it would seem. First they have to get Hubert out of the kitchen.

Now...as to the next question, when it’s coming out…

The short answer is, I don’t know. ;)

The longer answer is, publishers seem to have expected a “dark” book from me, and THE LUCKY ONE is light-hearted. While I received several offers, none were what I was looking for, and mostly focused beyond that manuscript on contracting for another book from me. I’m not prepared to sign for another (unwritten) book yet, although I’m working on my next one. Once I’m well into it, I may feel comfortable signing onto another deadline.

Now, before this information starts another one of those Woe and Doom discussions out there on the net because “even Laura Kinsale can’t sell a book,” I’ll add a little perspective. I had offers for the manuscript that most people would consider to amount to a nice annual salary. They weren’t bad offers at all. But for my own particular reasons, I didn’t accept.

Right now I write because I want to write, not simply to sell. I’ve found that is the only way I can continue to do it. Naturally publishers have an entirely different perspective. Who could blame them?  What makes sense to me now is to create a small backlog of work, so that I have books that can be published on industry schedules without putting me into driven deadline mode.

3. In your LLB interview from 2003, you mentioned that reading fiction now is like trying to watch a movie after you’ve been involved in the process too long. You lose sight of the forest for the individual knowledge of the lighting, the sound, the craft. Is that still true?

It’s pretty much still true.

4. I love your animal sidekicks, and how they often play an integral role in the story. One of my all-time favorites is Merlin’s pet hedgehog in Midsummer Moon, who literally helps save the day. Why a hedgehog?

The ducks were busy. ;P

5. Another animal question: your books have featured dogs, a wolf, a penguin, a pig, a ferret, several horses, a parrot, a falcon, sharks, a hedgehog--and the new one features a prize bull. In short, everything but a cat. Why no cats?

There are cats in my books!

6. A lot of writers write with soundtracks in their heads, and for The Lucky One, you mention that Alison Krauss’ The Lucky One was an inspiration. Do other books of yours feature musical inspirations?

I’m a musical barbarian; I know nothing much about it and I’m always years behind the curve on what’s popular.  I sometimes listen to a lot of my oldies but goodies while I write and occasionally as a book goes along, some song will strike me and perhaps have a small influence, but this is usually pretty limited.  That said, a reader told me about a song she’d heard that reminded her of THE DREAM HUNTER.  So I went out and got hold of it (Desert Rose by Sting) and now I Swear.To.God that he read that book and then wrote that song!  (The song is more recent than the book, hey.) It is a perfect match.  Anyone who really liked TDH, especially the desert part, should listen to it.

So I guess maybe that’s musical inspiration in reverse.  Or just acoincidence, but I can dream. ;)

7. Tell us how you feel about the Google Library project. Let us have it with both barrels, baby.

Both barrels, you say?  I have no objection to the Google project beyond that fact that they intend to do it without permission from the copyright holders.  Google does not have the right to profit from copying works which are owned by someone else.  They whine that it would be “too difficult” to find the copyright owners, but somehow it’s not too hard to scan the entire body of published literature.  And it’s not like the U.S. copyright office has an unlisted phone number.  Google claims they are offering an “opt out” of the project, but just try to find out how to opt out as an author.  Apparently only publishers can “opt out” as far as I can determine from spending hours that I didn’t have to spare in trying to find something about it on their site.  If you are an author, you are instructed to “contact your publisher” in order to opt out.  So again, the burden is on me to figure who in a couple of different publishing companies would happen to be in charge of this, and it’s fairly likely that nobody is.  So there would be a lot of calls and e-mails and nothing would happen but a big waste of my time, thanks to Google’s laziness in not bothering to find ME, the copyright holder, the person who spent years writing the stuff, to ask my permission to copy MY work for THEIR financial gain (or more likely their deliberate decision to make it difficult so that I won’t bother--a scheme that is succeeding quite well.) On top of that, in order to opt-out, you are required to submit PROOF that you are the copyright owner!  So here I am, having to come up with documentation that I own my own copyright so I can stop Google from infringing on it without my permission.

So yeah, I think Google is looking for a nice free ride while spouting a lot of high-falutin’ rhetoric about how this is going to increase authors’ sales--which is the equivalent of someone breaking into my house, looking over my stuff and proclaiming that it would be worth something at a garage sale.  If I don’t happen to want to sell it, they’ll just take it and put it in a garage sale for me, and tell me it’s in my own best interest because it will make money for me.  Maybe it will, maybe it won’t--I see no particular proof that someone happening across one of my books in a search engine would make them rush out and buy it new.  If Google wants to create a searchable library of literary works, they can take the time and effort to get permission from the owners of those works.  Just because something is a slight inconvenience doesn’t make it legal.  If this is so great for authors, they’ll be flocking to get their books scanned in.

The Authors Guild, in conjunction with a number of publishers, has filed suit to require Google to obtain the necessary permission to copy protected works.