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Monthly Archives: May 2007

Andrea Pickens started writing books at the age of 5 (or so her mother tells her!), with a Western tome lavishly illustrated with crayon drawings of horses. Since then she has moved from the Wild West to Regency England, with numerous titles for Signet, Pocket, and now Grand Central Publishing (nee Warner). She graduated from Yale University, and now lives and works in New York City as Creative Director of a magazine.

Commenters to the interview will be entered to win a copy of The Spy Wore Silk! Be sure and check out the Official Rules of Entry here. Winner announced on Tuesday!

Welcome to the Riskies, Andrea!

Q: First things first! Tell us about your new release…
A: The Spy Wore Silk is my first book with Grand Central Publishing! It’s the start of a Regency-set trilogy featuring a secret school for female spies. The students at Mrs. Merlin’s School for Select Young Ladies are streetwise orphans, who are trained in the arts of seduction and swordplay. They’re England’s ultimate secret weapon, dispatched to handle only the most dangerous assignments. It’s due out June 1, and I’m very excited about it! So far the feedback has been positive–it was a June Top Pick at Romantic Times, and received a nice review at Publishers Weekly, so I hope the readers enjoy it.

Q: What gave you the idea for the Merlins? What are the next stories for us to look forward to?
A: I love the swashbuckling fun of Pirates of the Caribbean, but found myself wishing Keira Knightley would do more arse-kicking of her own! So I started thinking–and decided it would be fun to make the heroine the secret agent, capable of beating powerful men at their own game. I also liked the challenge of having my heroes come to grips with women whose physical skills and intellect are as finely honed as their own.

The series features 3 roommates–Siena, Shannon, and Sofia. Each is assigned her own perilous mission, starting with Siena in The Spy Wore Silk. She must unmask a clever traitor lurking among an exclusive club of Society rare book collectors. Seduced by a Spy, due out in Spring ’08, follows Shannon to Ireland and the Scottish Highlands as she seeks to parry the attack of a French assassin. And Sofia’s story, as yet unnamed, follows her through the ballrooms and back alleys of London as she untangles a web of deceit.

These women are as close as sisters, but they each have very different personalities, with their own strengths and weaknesses!

Q: You had some great (and very unusual!) Regencies from Signet before you broke into the single title market. Which was your favorite of these books, and how do you think they differ from your new titles?
A: I think I’ve always been intrigued by trying to find a little twist to convention! One of my favorite Signet Regencies to write was A Diamond in the Rough, a golf story, where I had the hero forced to learn the game in order to win back the ancestral estate his father gambled away. The heroine is the best golfer at St. Andrews, but of course she has to play disguised as a boy. A friend asks her to teach the hero the game, so, acting as his caddie, she takes on the assignment. At first, it may seem sport and Regency romance don’t seem an ideal match. Which is probably what made me think “Oh, this could be fun!”

As to how the Signet stories differ from the new books, I would have to say they both explore ideas about unconventional heroines in unusual situations. The historical format allows a longer word count, so the stories can be a little more complex.

Q: Were there any challenges in researching the Merlins books? Any new or interesting historical facts you discovered?
A: I love research, so I’m always reading obscure books and poking around in used bookstores and antique shops for inspiration!

For The Spy Wore Silk, I found a wonderful resource by attending a lecture on using technology to teach Medieval history. There’s a section of the British Library’s website called “Turning the Pages.” It lets you actually thumb through rare medieval manuscripts and books and zoom in on details, so it was perfect for researching the illuminated psalters that play a part in the story.

In researching Shannon’s book, I found a great resource on gunpowder! So I fear the reader is going to be bombarded with a lot of little facts I found.

Q: What is it about the Regency period that makes you want to write about it?
A: I love how the era is so richly romantic. It was a world aswirl with silks, seduction, and the intrigue of the Napoleonic Wars. A time when old ideas were constantly clashing with radical new ones. What better place for an unconventional heroine?

Q: Who are some of your favorite authors/influences?
A: Well, I’ll start with you, Amanda! I love your books, and am really looking forward to your first Harlequin Historical! And of course I’m a big fan of Diane Gaston, Mary Jo Putney, Loretta Chase, Barbara Metzger, and Lynn Kerstan.

Q: The title of our blog says it all! We’re proud of our “Risky” Regencies. Tell us what’s “risky” about your stories?
I find the parallels between the Regency and today so intriguing, in that both societies confront elemental challenges to traditional ways of thinking. The upheavals in science, literature, music, technology, and social structure are so similar, and thus individuals–especially women–ask the same sort of questions about their basic sense of self. I try to play with modern sensibilities within Regency conventions, hoping the blend will strike a chord with today’s readers and still be historically authentic. I love historical romance to be alive and relevant, not some stuffy story we can’t relate to!

Q: Can we look for you at any appearances or booksignings soon?
A: I’ll be at RWA in Dallas, doing the Literacy signing, so please stop by and say hello!

Anna Campbell over at Romance Bandits tagged me for the 8 meme (list 8 random facts about yourself). I was VERY glad she did, since I had no idea what to blog about this week! (It was a hectic week, my Pug got an ear infection, I didn’t finish the WIP like I wanted, and Dancing With the Stars had its finale…)

So, here ’tis! Way more than you ever wanted to know about me, Amanda.

1) This is no surprise to anyone here at RR, though it might surprise people at the day job, who think I’m a serious, fairly normal, grown-up person. In reality, I am a crazed fan-girl. I have Steady Boyfriend Orlando (Pirates of the Caribbean opens today!!), New-ish Boyfriend Matthew Macfadyen, and Totally New Boyfriend Apolo Anton Ohno. If only I could put up their pics in my cubicle…

2) Another factoid not unknown to the Riskies (and related to #1)–I do love cheesy things (as well as actual cheese, come to think of it. Especially Gouda). I love Hello Kitty, garden gnomes, travel souvenirs like teapots shaped like the Tower of London, DWTS, and Disney movies. Also 1930s musicals with huge production numbers, where Fred and Ginger (in dresses made of feathers!) dance in a fake Venice or rain-swept gazebo.

3) I love music like Turandot, Mozart, Ravel, and Miles Davis. But I also like Abba. Especially Dancing Queen. And that Waterloo song.

4) I’ve worked in bookstores and libraries, in the office of a company that sets up estate sales, a classical music radio station, the marketing office of the symphony, and now back to a library. Where will I end up next??

5) In grad school, I specialized in Elizabethan poetry, just to be sure I’m totally unfit for any “real world” job. Therefore, I’m hopeless at sales calls and Excel spreadsheets, but if you ever need the symbolism analyzed in Sidney’s Astrophil and Stella, I’m your girl.

6) I’m the oldest child in my family, I have one brother who is several years younger. He’s a snowboarder and mountain biker, and doesn’t much like to read. Sometimes I wonder how we ended up in the same family, but I love him dearly.

7) I love raspberries and chocolate, cherry gelato (also saying the word “gelato”), samosas, and pad thai with shrimp. I hate brussels sprouts, lima beans, liver, and bananas (okay, I don’t ‘hate’ bananas, but I don’t much like them).

8) If I could live anywhere in the world, it would be Maui. Or the English countryside. I can’t quite decide. A bungalow near the beach or a cozy Tudor cottage?

I’m supposed to now tag 8 people, but instead I’m going to tag all of you! List your 8 in our comments–let us get to know you. Enjoy the holiday weekend, and be sure and sign up for our Riskies newsletter at riskies@yahoo.com. Please don’t make us list 8 reasons why you should…


Although there are many things I don’t envy about the Regency, I do wish there was more formality these days. The thing is, I can be painfully shy in social situations, but if there was a proscribed method of behavior I would be a lot more comfortable.

Last night, we celebrated my husband’s 40th birthday. A group of his friends gathered at a restaurant and helped devour an entire roasted pig (and pictures are forthcoming, but I haven’t gotten them yet–I forgot my own camera, duh.). Of course, there were friends of his–from work, mostly–who I didn’t know, and it felt awkward, the whole going up and introducing myself thing, then the idle chit-chat, then the standing around and stuff. I was wishing some dowager would sail in out of nowhere and command Mr. So-and-So to dance with me or something, so I would have something to do. And if it were a lord? Woo-hoo, let the muslin dampen!

My shyness is one of the reasons, ironically enough, I thrived so well in event planning; I had a purpose, I knew why I was there, which made me totally comfortable. Maybe that’s why some of our shy heroines don’t do so badly after all in the ball room: They know they are there to find a husband, and either they are okay with that (usually not), or they are equally determined NOT to find a husband. Either way, they have a goal, a method of behavior that is proscribed and understood, and everyone else there knows their role, too.

How about you? Are you shy in social situations? Or do you wish you were making your come-out at a ball given in your honor, with all eyes upon you?

Megan
PS: This pic is of a real wallflower, although it doesn’t appear anywhere near a wall. Go figure.

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Yes, today is Queen Victoria’s birthday. She was born in 1819, the daughter of Edward, Duke of Kent, and Victoria of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfield. Apparently the Prince Regent threw a hissy fit about her christening because he didn’t like his brother and was upset, since the death of Princess Charlotte, that one of the Duke’s children might succeed him. So she wasn’t given one of the “traditional” family names–Charlotte, Elizabeth, Georgina or Augusta–and the Prince Regent decided she should be called Alexandrina Victoria (the Alexandrina in deference to her godfather by proxy, Russian Tsar Alexander). Victoria came to the throne in 1837 and ruled until her death in 1901.

Now the history lecture is over, I want you to take out your notebooks and…

Sometimes it seems that the Victorian and Regency ages overlap and sometimes they seem poles apart. Fashions changed radically. So did attitudes–or did they? The Regency era had the great infrastructure of the Royal Mail, and then a few decades later the railway changed the countryside and people’s perceptions of time and distance. The Victorians were prudes but Bowdler was busy cleaning up Shakespeare in the Regency.

What comes to your mind when you think of the Victorian Age? What do you like about the Victorian era that wasn’t around during the Regency?

Janet

Sign up for the Riskies newsletter at riskies@yahoo.com and we’ll come over and lace you into your stays! Just kidding. But we will send you advance notice every month of what fun stuff is coming up. Put NEWSLETTER in the subject line so we don’t throw you away.

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I love, love, love trip planning! So after my post a few weeks ago about my writers’ retreat I couldn’t help fantasizing about a Risky Retreat. It probably won’t be practical to do this for some time but just thinking about it was fun.

As far as location, a country house inn somewhere in England would be ideal. Someplace we could all find plenty of peace to write (or read–our non-writing Risky visitors would be welcome too!) Maybe some side excursions to stately homes or museums. And of course, great food and wine.

I thought about some of my husband’s and my favorite getaways in England, country inns like Trengilly Wartha Inn in Cornwall or the Waltzing Weasel in the Peak District but these are perhaps a bit small and not quite the Regency feel. So I googled around a bit and here’s what I found.

How about Middlethorpe Hall in Yorkshire (above). According to the website, it’s “a William III country house, close to the city, set in 20 acres of its own gardens and parkland. Built in 1699, it was once the home of the famous diarist, Lady Mary Wortley Montagu.” How cool would is that? It also has a Health & Fitness Spa so we could exercise, have beauty treatments, massages, etc…, or just plot our next award-winning novels in the whirlpool.

Or how about Hunstrete House? It’s situated on 71 acres of woodland, gardens and deerpark and situated between Bath and Wells, convenient for side excursions to either.

Or Hintlesham Hall in Suffolk? It looks like another lovely spot, also with a health club. And maybe we could get them to do a Sabrage evening for us?

So what do you think? Other suggestions of places to stay? Do you like the idea of just reading, writing and excursions or are there other special activities you’d want to add? Any fantasy guests you’d like to invite?

Elena 🙂
www.elenagreene.com

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