Author Archives: Elena Greene

About Elena Greene

Elena Greene grew up reading anything she could lay her hands on, including her mother's Georgette Heyer novels. She also enjoyed writing but decided to pursue a more practical career in software engineering. Fate intervened when she was sent on a three year international assignment to England, where she was inspired to start writing romances set in the Regency. Her books have won the National Readers' Choice Award, the Desert Rose Golden Quill and the Colorado Romance Writers' Award of Excellence. Her Super Regency, LADY DEARING'S MASQUERADE, won RT Book Club's award for Best Regency Romance of 2005 and made the Kindle Top 100 list in 2011. When not writing, Elena enjoys swimming, cooking, meditation, playing the piano, volunteer work and craft projects. She lives in upstate New York with her two daughters and more yarn, wire and beads than she would like to admit.

Cover Reveal!

Updated on June 28, 2013 by Elena Greene

My apologies for not being around much this week. I’ve been fighting another sinus infection while madly trying to finish the latest version of the balloonist story and get it out to my critique partners.

The good news is I finally settled on a title and I have a cover! Please forgive the historically inaccurate shirtlessness–I decided it was more important to convey the level of sensuality and make sure people didn’t mistake this for a sweet traditional Regency.

I’m hoping to get the critique-ready ms out by tomorrow, before taking my oldest to a 3 week summer youth program (first time she’s away that long), so I don’t have much time to chat. But here’s the short blurb I came up with for the story.

A village schoolmistress’s life takes a turn when a Waterloo veteran turned aeronaut crashes near her cottage. Passion sweeps them along, taking them on a scandalous flight across the English countryside. They must marry, but can they make a life together?

Now I’m off to re-edit the Dreaded Chapter 27 (which required an untold number of Hershey’s nuggets to write in the first place). Please wish me luck!

Elena
www.elenagreene.com
www.facebook.com/ElenaGreene

Posted in Risky Book Talk, Risky Regencies | 8 Replies

Effeminate heroes or drag queen heroines?

Updated on June 19, 2013 by Elena Greene

Now that I’m finally close to having a version of the balloonist story (title coming soon, I promise!) to send to my critique partners, I’m looking into yet another project. I’m considering doing an audio book version of Lady Dearing’s Masquerade.

I have a good friend who swears by audio books, since she spends a lot of time on the road. On the other hand, I have never listened to one. I’ve just never had the need. But the popularity of audio books is growing, so I’m working on getting educated.

I’ve listened to a number of samples from romance audio books, just to get an idea of how narration works. Since there’s usually just a single narrator, he or she has to do the dialogue for all the characters: hero, heroine, and everyone else, developing distinct voices for each. It seems quite the challenge.

Some authors choose to narrate their own books, but I know I’m not up to it! I can’t even do a British accent, which is one thing I know I want.

Another choice is whether it’s best in romance to have a female or male narrator.

This issue was discussed pretty thoroughly at the All About Romance blog post Speaking of Audio: Male versus Female Narrators. The question was, if one had to choose, would one “prefer to listen to an effeminate sounding hero or a drag queen heroine”?

As it turns out, with a good narrator, one can avoid either extreme.

Though I’m sure these actor/narrators are out of my reach, here are two examples I really liked:

The first is a sample from Flowers from the Storm by Laura Kinsale, narrated by Nicholas Boulton. Please listen. You will enjoy it!

As an example of a talented female narrator, here’s a sample from Lady Sophia’s Lover by Lisa Kleypas, narrated by Susan Duerden.

Do you listen to audio books? For romance, do you prefer a male or female narrator? Or does it really depend more on how the narrator handles each character?

Elena
www.elenagreene.com
www.facebook.com/ElenaGreene

Posted in Writing | Tagged Audio Books, Nicholas Boulton, Susan Duerden | 4 Replies

“A creaking swing door gave her warning”

Updated on May 31, 2013 by Elena Greene

Over the recent long weekend, I started a major cleanup and reorganization of my writing room. As it’s also our home office, it had gotten cluttered with all sorts of stuff, most of it not writing-related. Anyway, the task is not done (there are bookshelves and cubbies you can’t see that still need attention) but I did find my desk!

Some creative people seem to thrive in clutter, but I really don’t. Clutter makes me feel I ought to be cleaning something rather than writing. I do have a few tchotchkes for fun and inspiration, including the “lucky stone” found while walking on the beach with Gail Eastwood last summer. (She told me that stones circled by an unbroken band of a different color were said to bring good luck.)

I found this article in the Guardian about Jane Austen’s working space at Chawton.

It’s very plain and simple; check out the link for the picture. Here’s a quote from the article:

Having no room of her own, she established herself near the little-used front door, and here “she wrote upon small sheets of paper which could easily be put away, or covered with a piece of blotting paper”. A creaking swing door gave her warning when anyone was coming, and she refused to have the creak remedied.

I also like my privacy. My family has learned not to interrupt me when I’m writing and I find it difficult to work in public spaces. I can do editing there, but not the more vulnerable work of fresh writing.

I also like taking walks to clear my mind and work out plot snags. This has been true of writers for a long time. Some Regency era poets certainly did so, according to this section from The Immortal Dinner by Penelope Hughes-Hallett.

He (William Hazlitt) said that Coleridge liked to compose ‘in walking over uneven ground, or breaking through the straggling branches of a copse-wood’; but Wordsworth preferred to write whenever possible ‘walking up and down a straight gravel-walk, or in some spot where the continuity of his verse met with no collateral interruption.’

She also wrote that:

For the ‘Ode to a Nightingale’, his friend Charles Brown recalled that Keats took his chair from the breakfast table out into the garden of Wentworth Place and sat writing under a plum tree, returning indoors with a completed draft only two or three hours, a time span a little hard to credit.

I will probably never be a fast writer, but I also like working outdoors. I do that sometimes on writers’ retreats. At home, when it’s warm enough, I like working in our enclosed porch (no bugs to distract me, but big windows give the feeling of being outdoors).

How about you? Whether or not you’re a writer, are there special places or ways you like to work?

Elena
www.elenagreene.com
www.facebook.com/ElenaGreene

Posted in Writing | Tagged writing habits, writing spaces | 2 Replies

Fantasy men…

Updated on May 24, 2013 by Elena Greene

…these are not. This picture is of some of the Prince Regent’s friends, several of whom are dukes and proof that “Duke=Hawt” is an invention of Romancelandia.

I’m thinking about this in the wake of all the good discussions we’ve had related to whether historical romance, especially Regency historical romance, is dead or deserves to be. If you missed any of this conversation, here are the links:

“Sick of the Regency?” by Diane

“One day after all the editors went home, the slush pile and an abandoned marketing research plan partied hard” by Carolyn

“In the Regency but not wholly of the Regency” by Susanna

My question is: do we need more variety in our heroes?

We’ve discussed dukes and their prevalence in the genre before: “Duking it Out” (by me) and more recently, a couple of posts from Carolyn: “The Case Against Dukes” and In Defense of Dukes”.

The hero who’s a wealthy and powerful lord is an immensely popular trope in historical romance, with dukes being the epitome of that trope. A while ago, I even heard of an editor telling an author her hero must be a duke. It makes me think of Georgette Heyer’s Frederica, in which the heroine’s little brother decides it’s OK for her to marry the hero, a marquess, even if he is a “second best nobleman.” Sheesh.

Anyway, at its weakest, this trope is about the fantasy of being cared for and living a life of leisure. But don’t we want heroines who are strong women, useful rather than merely decorative?

One of Carolyn’s posts on dukes provided a good answer:

The hero is powerful in all the things that will offer a heroine safety during a time when women were dependent on men for their safety. He’s Prince Charming and his heroine is going to democratize him (emphasis mine).

The ending in which she can be a partner to him and help him use all that wealth and power wisely makes this trope satisfying, for me at least. Bring on the dukes, just write them well. But I’m very happy when writers tackle stories about different heroes, such as younger sons who have a different set of challenges.

Then there are heroes not born into the aristocracy. Rare but they exist. I know at least some of us find that type attractive.

I’m especially intrigued by Janet’s recent excerpt and by Susanna’s description of her upcoming release A Dream Defiant. Unless I’ve missed something (admittedly I haven’t read everything out there) writing black heroes is ground-breaking for the genre.

More variety in heroes ought to strengthen the genre. Not that I think anyone should force herself to write something just to be different, just that she shouldn’t feel constrained by the popular tropes if she wants to do something different.

The publishing environment supports greater variety now than ever, although that comes with other issues. The stories you want to read may be out there, but finding them can still be a challenge. Certainly we will talk about some of them here.

What do you think? Are there types of “risky” heroes would you like to see more of?

Elena
www.elenagreene.com
www.facebook.com/ElenaGreene

Posted in Reading, Writing | 5 Replies

Lessons from the Lake

Updated on May 10, 2013 by Elena Greene

Last week, I blogged about going on a writers’ retreat with friends. We rented a house in the Finger Lakes and piled in with our usual supplies: plenty of wine, coffee and chocolate. We worked, we hiked, we drank wine, we talked and we laughed.

Does it sound idyllic? In many ways it was, but this time I also tackled the biggest challenge I’ve ever brought to a retreat: to finish the book I had to take several years’ break from due to my husband’s stroke and whose ending was still giving me fits.

So my inner writing demons were out in full force, telling me I’d never figure out all the plot snarls. I’ve learned to treat those demons like old friends. I don’t fight them; I just tell them to sit down and relax while I work.

It also helps to switch methods. When I couldn’t write scenes, I brainstormed in a composition notebook, using my favorite blue Pilot G2 gel pen. I went for frequent walks or paced the deck overlooking the lake. Once in a while, I played the piano. After each break, I went back to the story and each time, like a gift, answers came.

So the retreat ended up being like having a beautifully decorated and perfectly equipped delivery room for a difficult birth. With my writing friends as doulas!

Anyway, I’m so glad the story is finally coming together.
Thanks for your support, Riskies and friends!

Elena
www.elenagreene.com
www.facebook.com/ElenaGreene

P.S. I’m running the following giveaway at Goodreads.