Published September 6, 2010 in Publisher's Weekly

During an auction for the audio rights to my new novel, Dracula in Love, my editor forwarded me an e-mail from one of the bidders. "This book is so hot that I can't wait to get home to my wife!" he proclaimed, and then outbid everyone else and presumably went home and made his wife happy.

We were delighted to hear that feedback because during the writing process, we had tortuous debates over just how much sex would be too much. My most trusted readers are my agent, my editor, and my manager (yes, I'm lucky), and each had very different responses. Without giving away proclivities, two on the team kept begging for more, though what one thought erotic, the other sometimes found terrifying. The third loved every sensual drop, but kept reminding us of the puritanical level of the basic American reader, specifically, the literary reader, that elite creature who relies on a host of signifiers to be distinguished from the genre reader. She pointed out that the book had the elements that discriminating readers look for in a literary work: a strong, authoritative voice, painstakingly composed prose, and serious themes. "This book is too rich to have its seriousness dismissed because of the sex scenes," our cautionary voice reminded us. "You know how readers are! They see some sex on the page and assume it's a bodice-ripper."

Let me say that I set out to write something that was both literary and erotic, something that did not hint at searing sex as the chapter closes but truly explored women's sexual pleasure. One of my biggest motivations for reimagining Bram Stoker's brilliant novel Dracula from the female perspective was the hyper-misogyny of the original. Today, the book is often read as a cautionary tale against the unbridling of female sexuality at the end of the 19th century.

In Dracula in Love, I wanted to turn the original story inside out, exposing its underbelly, or its "subconscious mind." A great part of what could not be expressed in any quarter in the 1890s was women's sexual pleasure. In fact, in my research, I discovered case after case in asylum archives of women being committed for having what we today would consider normal sex drives. Stoker's prose is rife with fomenting sexuality; the fun in retelling the tale was to express the formerly forbidden aspects.

Yet I have received huffy complaints from some readers that I did a disservice to the book—that I cheapened both the book and its female protagonist—by including sex scenes. A few readers have expressed "shock" and others have been upset by "the author's need to shock."

Let's dissect this. The point of my books is to give voice to otherwise voiceless females from history and myth, to unlock what has been secreted away in women's hearts and minds for millennia. Historically, women have either been reduced to nothing but their sexuality or stripped of it entirely: the Madonna or the whore. Are we, the "literary," still obeying the ancient good girl/bad girl paradigm that has bifurcated and inhibited women for millennia? Is there a knee-jerk dichotomy in the minds of serious readers: no sex, please, we're literary?

Far from wanting to shock, I wanted to delight, to thrill, and to illuminate in ways that were impossible in the 1890s. I wanted to envelop the reader in the lush velvet of the Victorian era, with its contained and corseted sensuality cloaked with layers of delicate lace, and in some cases, restrained with leather straps and strait jackets. I also wanted to avoid the prevalent literary construct in which female characters explore sexual taboos, but are fraught with shame and self-loathing.

A recent reviewer declared that the sex in Dracula in Love, while erotic, was tasteful, because the writing was more "artistic" than "literary." Precisely what that means, I do not know, but if "literary" implies either the absence of sex, or linking pleasure and self-loathing, I'll take "artistic" any day.

If readers enjoy the literary writer's descriptions of place, of food, of all manner of things appealing to the senses, why shy away from visceral, transporting descriptions of sex? If sex debases women and literature, please tie me up and spank me, then wrap my books in brown paper and sell them from below the counter

In honor of the official publication date of Dracula in Love, the vampire’s muse has broken her century-long silence in an exclusive interview with Fangoria Magazine. Read what the once quintessential Victorian virgin has to say about 21st century rehab, Internet porn, and her nostalgia for velvet:

EXCLUSIVE: MINA HARKER SPEAKS!

Meanwhile, one of America’s top mortal voices, the esteemed Bruce Feiler, New York Times columnist, peripatetic historian, and repeated New York Times Bestseller list offender, has posted his thoughts about Dracula in Love on Amazon:
http://www.amazon.com/Dracula-Love-Karen-Essex/dp/0385528914/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1281275252&sr=1-1

Just when I thought mortal life could not get much better, the New York Post named Dracula in Love Required Reading: http://bit.ly/dicW7L

If you, intrepid reader, want to know the whole truth AND make my day, please order your copy of Dracula in Love (and copies for family and friends so they won’t feel left out) at your choice of bookseller:




Hope you’re enjoying our dwindling days of summer. See below for GIVEAWAYS, ETC.

Ever yours—
Karen

INTERVIEWS, GIVEAWAYS & POSTS:

‘Til midnight August 15th PST, click the “Like” button on the “Dracula in Love by Karen Essex” Facebook page and automatically be entered to win a signed copy of your choice of my backlisted books (except Bettie Page. Sorry!). http://www.facebook.com/pages/Dracula-in-Love-By-Karen-Essex/124181927628332

August 10th — I join Vicki Leon (How to Mellify a Corpse) on her blog:
http://vickileon.com/blog/

Featured interview in August edition of Bookpage: http://www.bookpage.com/books.php?id=10013526

Featured Q&A in The Nervous Breakdown, with Juliet author Anne Fortier supplying the Qs: http://www.thenervousbreakdown.com/

August 11th – “Why I Love Vampires” post on Historical Tapestry: http://historicaltapestry.blogspot.com

Til August 21st – THREE BOOK GIVEAWAY at Passages to the Past. Enter here:
http://www.passagestothepast.com/2010/08/3-copy-giveaway-dracula-in-love-by.html

Special Friday the 13th Q&A + Giveaway at Patricia’s Vampire Notes: http://patricias-vampire-notes.blogspot.com/

August 15th – Essay for Publisher’s Weekly: “No Sex, Please, We’re Literary.”
http://www.publishersweekly.com

I am hanging onto my rain hat here in London as August 10th, the pub date for DRACULA IN LOVE approaches. Reviews thus far have been absolutely amazing, more than I dared wish for. From book bloggers who compare it to novels by the Brontës and Anne Rice, to a veritable rave in FANGORIA Magazine, the number one horror publication in the world, I’ve been gratified and humbled by this outpouring of generous words.

Let me assure you that THERE WILL BE BLOOD AND THEIR WILL BE PARTIES. The kick-off celebration is on September 20th at Fraiche Santa Monica, and you are all invited. We will provide delights of all kinds, including special appearances by the Undead. The festivities will move through Southern California and then across the country, culminating ‘round Halloween in New Orleans at the Vampire Film Festival.

Check your email, visit www.KarenEssex.com, or go to the new DRACULA IN LOVE Facebook page to find out about the events in your part of the world. We’ll be announcing them as they are confirmed.

By the way, if you are associated with a bookstore, a college or university, or a venue that hosts events, please contact me about a performance piece based on DRACULA IN LOVE that is being set up around the country.

I’m going to end with quotes from the pre-pub reviews, including links to just a few of the book bloggers who support authors. Please visit their sites and follow their reviews. These folks have become a force in publishing, and they do this not for pay but for the sheer love of literature.

And, as always, if you want to have a part in the destiny of DRACULA IN LOVE, please order a copy (and one for each of your vampire-or-gothic novel-loving friends) at your bookseller of choice.


As ever,
Karen

THE GUSH over DRACULA IN LOVE:

“If the spirits of the dead call out to you, swaddle yourself tight with your shawl, make the sign of the cross for protection, and walk away.” Like the spirits of the dead, DRACULA IN LOVE (coming August 10 from Doubleday) calls out to the reader—but instead of walking away, you should run to this fresh perspective on Bram Stoker’s classic novel.”
—FANGORIA MAGAZINE

“On the back of the book one review reads ‘if you read only one more vampire novel, let it be this one.’ I say if you read only one more literary novel, let it be this one. Dracula in love is a masterpiece. Not only does it turn the classic tale on its head, at times it reads much better than the original. “
—The View From Sari’s World

“Karen Essex's prose is beautiful, draping itself around you and slowly drawing you in. Dracula in Love is erotic and passionate, and everything you'd want in a gothic love story. It's haunting, it's wonderful and I LOVED it!”
—Chick with Books Blogspot

“The book is being touted on the back cover as TWILIGHT for grown-ups, which is almost an insult, because it is so much better than that and better written…I can just imagine the T-shirts saying Team Jonathan and Team Dracula!)… This book will send shivers up and down your spine and in a good way. Lush, mysterious, and unabashedly sensual, Essex pulls out all the stops and actually, in my opinion, improves on Stoker's novel.

WARNING: I plan on gushing like a crazed fan girl about this book…”
—SCANDALOUS WOMAN


“What I really want to do is just gush and slobber all over the place in response to this book. It's really difficult to come up with anything intelligent to say about it because I'm still dribbling over it like an idiot. I LOVED THIS BOOK. It is sinful, and decadent and violently romantic- there were whole passages that I just want to dip in chocolate and eat.”
—LIFE AFTER JANE

“Essex weaves an enchanting tale and portrayed her visions of darkened Victorian England with ease. I concur with C.W. Gortner and repeat that this is one that you should not miss…This novel achieves the nuance of the gorgeous cover and presents a very titillating narrative from Mina Murray through the enviable prose of Karen Essex.”
—THE BURTON REVIEW



“Verdict Beautifully written, this novel by the author of Leonardo's Swans features vivid images of drama, danger, and romance…Romance and vampire fiction buffs will snap this one up.” [See Prepub Alert, LJ 3/15/10.]—Patricia Altner, Biblioinfo.com, Columbia, MD
—LIBRARY JOURNAL

“I would have to say that Essex has astonished me with her “Dracula In Love” because she combined Anne Rice’s sensuality and historical practicality with Twilights modern romantic edge. “Dracula In Love” held all of the adult components that Twilight was lacking for me.
5/5++ I loved this book…Essex has made the perfect vampire book for the avid historical fiction lover.”
—HISTORICALLY OBSESSED

“Hang on to your Team Edward novelty baseball hats, because this ain’t your teenager’s vampire novel.
This book is dark. It’s mysterious. It’s sensual. This is a real gothic novel, the way they are supposed to be written. Dracula in Love is a beautifully writtten and wildly addictive novel. I suggest it to anyone…”
—A HESITANT HOUSEWIFE

“Don’t fall for the Twilight hook – this is definitely not as tame as Twilight (those are words I never thought I might say). But for those of you adults who want a “real” vampire story, one that includes dark, mysterious characters and focuses around the Sidhe and the old stories of powerful female vampires – yeah this is the book for you. Dark, spooky, horrifying…and filled with a romance that will make you shiver and look over your shoulder.”
—THE LOST ENTWIFE

“A sensual, without being sordid story, full of real characters that at the last page keeps the reader wanting more.”
—Celtic Lady’s Reviews

After forty-three months of research and writing, and a lifelong fascination with the esoteric, I am happy to announce that DRACULA IN LOVE, my fifth novel, will be published by Doubleday in August 2010. There is blood on the pages, faithful readers, but it is not only from the vampire’s bite. I would like to share with you just a little of the bizarre process of writing this most rebellious of books. It was as if a supernatural being had taken possession of my research and my typing fingers for its own purposes.

In the early stages, the protagonist refused to appear on the page as I had imagined her and came forth with a personality and agenda of her own, speaking to me in a voice I did not recognize. For months, I wasn’t sure that I even liked her! She and the rest of the characters defied my painstakingly constructed one hundred twenty-page outline and forged their own paths, which they would only reveal to me in stingy little increments. I burned a thousand candles and listened to sacred music in my London flat hoping to persuade the writing gods to give me back my book, but ultimately, I had to capitulate and allow them to do as they wished, though I had no idea where they were taking me. In the end, it is a far richer, more surprising, and more thrilling novel for the characters having taken stern control of their destinies.

If you too would like a role in the book’s fate, please preorder a copy below or at your independent bookstore. Pre-orders are often discounted and play a HUGE role in determining the future of this or any book.


Or just explore this DRACULA IN LOVE link:
http://www.karenessex.com/draculasynop.html

I will be sending more news of the events, parties, performances, and giveaways starting in August and continuing through the rest of the year. Meanwhile, I thank each and every one of you for supporting my books and wish you a lovely spring.

Ever yours—

Karen


"Dark, gothic, and utterly sensual, Dracula in Love is the novel for Twilight's grownup fans. “
—Michelle Moran, bestselling author of Nefertiti: A Novel


"Dracula in Love is a sensual fantasy feast, a flight of the imagination, a darkly rich pleasure.  Like The French Lieutenant's Woman, the novel explores and exposes the stifling confines of Victorian society, especially upon women.  But the means of deliverance is altogether different.
—Margaret George, New York Times bestselling author of Memoirs of Cleopatra and Helen of Troy


"Karen Essex turns the legendary tale of immortal love into a seductive, blood-tingling celebration of the senses. If you read only one more vampire novel, let it be this one!"
—C.W. Gortner, author of The Last Queen & The Confessions of Catherine de Medici

KE: The film producer Lynda Obst once told me that she came up with the idea for the George Clooney/Michelle Pfeiffer romantic comedy One Fine Day, when she—overworked, exhausted—was lying on a massage table thinking that to meet a man she would have to literally crash into one with her car. Andrew Davidson, who I chatted with recently on the blog, opened his bestseller, The Gargolye, with a car accident that transforms his character, body and soul. And I have always been a fan of the late painter Carlos Almaraz’s oils depicting cars in flames. What is it about art and car wrecks?

Now, I find that two very fine authors, who also happen to be friends of mine, have each opened their new novels with car accidents. Penny Vincenzi, the No. 1 bestselling British novelist, whose books are addictive and virtually impossible to put down (she’s doing this chat because she owes me for so many nights of lost sleep), uses a car crash in the beginning of The Best of Times as a device by which the characters become entangled in one another’s lives.

Christina Baker Kline, Fordham University’s Writer in Residence, opens her acclaimed fourth novel, Bird in Hand, with a car accident that brings out the hidden alienation festering below the surface of existing friendships and marriages. I found the book impossible to put down and read it one night in lieu of sleeping.

Ladies, could you please tell us what inspired you to open your novels with car crashes? Did the idea of opening a book with an accident inspire the novels, or did you have relationships in mind that you wanted to explore, and retrospectively decided to use the car crashes as the catalyst? In other words, was it the chicken first, or the egg?

PV: It was a real-life accident that inspired me to write The Best of Times. Well, two actually. The first was an accident that actually took place on the motorway I use all the time as I travel from our cottage in Wales to our house in London—or on this particular occasion to my publishers. I was nowhere near the accident itself; but stuck in the consequential tailback for almost three hours.

It is complete impotence; you can’t go on, you can’t go back, you are held suspended in time and place by Fate. I was lucky—not merely because I hadn’t been nearer the front of the crash, but also because my meeting was hardly crucial. What I had to endure was annoying, and made life a little more awkward, but no more than that. Around me were people more seriously affected: one young man said if he didn’t get to London in time to sign some documents at his bank by close of play, his business would go under. A couple were desperate to get to the airport—not just for a holiday trip, but to attend their daughter’s wedding next day in Spain. An elderly gentleman was on his way, driven by his daughter, to an important medical appointment he had waited three months’ for. All around me were seriously distressed people. Less serious were thirsty dogs, fractious hungry children, and lots of people in need of a loo.

And you know what? I thought: this is a book. About all sorts of people in all sorts of people, being taken into captivity by fate: and what would happen to their consequent lives. Like a husband perhaps, helplessly trapped with his mistress, in a place where he had no business to be, not at all where he had said he would be; like a bridegreoom, hurrying to his wedding; like an actress, desperate to get to a last-chance audition. Oh, my goodness!-- as always, when this sort of thing happens to me, I guiltily stopped worrying about other people and started making notes….

KE: Penny, I am reminded of the story of the man who worked in the Twin Towers whose wife was calling his cellphone all morning on 9/11 to see if he was alive. He was, but was with a mistress at a hotel and knew nothing of the tragedy. When he finally returned her call, she asked where he’d been all morning, and he blithely replied that he was at the office!

PV: Oh and then the second accident was domestic; my daughter and her boyfriend had come to spend the night with us, so that he could be at an interview, an important interview-- in London early in the morning. He was wearing his best suit as he sat at the kitchen table, having a late night glass of wine with us and showing us his carefully prepared CV—pages of it. .

And then—my daughter passing the table, knocked her father’s arm, as he lifted the bottle to pour a second glass of wine. Red wine. Which went all over the best suit. A light grey suit.

We sat and stared at it in horror; everything in that instant changed, from order to chaos. All our plans were scuppered—or so it seemed; the early, and therefore calm, start; the immaculate appearance, the beautiful presentation. And—possibly, or even probably—his chances of getting the job. All for the jog of an arm. Terrifying.

(I would like to reassure you that we managed; plunged the jacket into cold water—risky, but better than nothing—oh the wonders of the man-made fibre. We transferred his notes to my computer, admittedly with a sweatily difficult juggling of emails and attachments--oh, the wonders of technology--and printed them afresh. It was summer and we hung the jacket by an open window and my daughter completed its drying in the morning with a hairdryer. He wore a shirt of my husband’s –a little large, but we decided it didn’t matter; and he got the job.) But—what a jog of an arm can do. What an accident, a moment’s chance, can do.

CBK: When I first moved to the suburbs of NYC after years of living on the Upper West Side, with my husband and two young children, one of our first purchases was a minivan. I hadn’t driven in years, much less an unwieldy, seven-seat bus, and I was filled with anxiety. New Jersey traffic can be fast and unforgiving; caught in the maze of unfamiliar roads, I was constantly losing my bearings. My children’s lives were in my hands – my white-knuckled hands, that is, gripping the steering wheel. I was terrified of getting in a car crash that was my own fault and being responsible for maiming, or killing, my child or – god forbid – someone else’s.

Around this same time, I began writing Bird in Hand. The central character, a mother, gets into an accident in which a child dies, and this accident changes the (interconnected) lives of four people. Somewhere along the way I realized that I was writing this book as a way of exploring my deepest fears around this subject – and that those fears were too close. It was like staring directly into the sun; I had to squint and turn away. I put the manuscript in a drawer and only came back to it after several years, when my children were older and my worries had subsided. (For one thing, I’d become a fairly competent driver.) And I broadened the scope of the novel: the accident became a catalyst for the larger story rather than the story itself.

KE: I also happen to know that both of these authors are writing about infidelity from within stable long-term marriages that have produced many offspring. Penny has four grown daughters, and Christina has three young sons, and neither has traded in her husband for a new model! Bird in Hand puts marital infidelity under a brutally strong microscope, and yet the vision is not without compassion. The Best of Times also has married folk sneaking around. Penny has written about marital infidelity in her many books—enough, some might say, to place her in an Unfaithfully Yours Literary Hall of Fame. But she, too, writes with compassion for all parties, faithful and faithless alike.

Is it tricky to explore these waters from within a marriage (that one wishes to keep!)? Do your husbands eye you with suspicion? Have their friends warned them that you two know a little bit too much about this subject? Or does a solid marriage and domestic scene give you a secure base from which to explore the opposite scenario?

PV: Well, yes. Three things here.

1. I may have been long and happily married, but I have come across many many stories of people who have not. I have never, ever written directly, or even indirectly about anything real-life, but the bones of those stories stay with me, to be filled out with some quite different flesh. And you know what? To paraphrase Tolstoy, every unhappy marriage is unhappy in a different way.

2. I do have an imagination.

3. The escape into fantasy is a wonderful antidote to real life. Writing a book you can be beautiful, thin, witty, rich. You can meet incredible people and particularly incredible men. Who you can flirt with, lunch with, fall in love with, have passionate affairs with; all from the absolute safety and security of your study. Many is the time I have risen from a rumpled double bed in some luxurious hotel suite, a jeroboam of champagne at its side—shut the door behind me and gone downstairs with the dog—my only real-life companion in these adventures--to cook the stew for family
supper, feeling—I’ll admit-- just mildly titillated, but absolutely virtuous.

CBK: In real life, I am something of a romantic – and happily married! But I also know that marriage can be hard at times, even under the best of circumstances. While I was writing this novel my husband, David, and I were, like many of our friends, adjusting to profound life changes: a new house, a new lifestyle, two small children, loss of autonomy for both of us, some loss of identity for me, a stressful job for him, a commute into the city. Some couples we knew, close friends, did not weather these storms intact. Why and how did these marriages end? The answers to these kinds of questions are always complicated.

At one point in my book a character wonders, “Who breaks the thread, the one who pulls or the one who hangs on?” In Bird in Hand I wanted to write about the complexities many couples deal with at this stage of their lives, whether or not they come through together. I wanted to show what’s hard about marriage and what happens when people can’t figure out how to communicate with each other. I wanted to follow my characters to all the dark and elusive places. Most of all, I wanted to talk about the nature of love and desire.

Though my husband read bits and pieces along the way, this is the first of my novels that he has not yet finished. (It’s on his nightstand still.) It isn’t autobiographical, but I think it’s still a bit hard to read. As you well know, novelists are like magpies – opportunistic scavengers who feather our nests with whatever we find lying around. I used my own life in many ways in Bird in Hand. I think that these four characters are all me, and they’re all my husband. They’re also lots of other people I’ve met. And no one at all. I felt like an actor (or perhaps several actors) writing this book: I truly inhabited these characters. I became them as I wrote.

KE: It is always fascinating for me to learn the genesis of a novel. The threads of a novel’s fabric are gathered from so many sources and the weaving process is such a complex balance of artistry, craft, and surrender to the unconscious, that it makes it challenging to try to explain. Yet the discussion is always illuminating.
Thank you, my friends, for participating.

At the HNS Conference, C. W. Gortner and I caught the great Margaret George red-handed in the bookstore buying our books. We were so thrilled that we had to have the incident preserved for posterity!

KE: At the Historical Novel Society Conference this summer, Margaret George, C. W. (Christopher) Gortner and I answered questions about gender and the art—and marketing—of historical fiction. Margaret’s novel, The Autobiography of Henry VIII: With Notes by His Fool, Will Somers (1998), is now a beloved classic, and it was written in the voice of a man, about another man, but by a female author (I sound like I’m pitching Victor/Victoria!). Christopher’s new novel, The Last Queen, has received much acclaim, and it is written in the voice Juana “la Loca.” I have written in the male voice, and I feel that two of the most authentic and inspired character portraits I have ever written were Julius Caesar and the eunuch Meleager, both from my Kleopatra series.

I think it’s fair to say that all three of us challenge the notion that one can only write with authenticity in the voice of one’s own sex. If you don’t think that idea is prevalent, you should sit in on classes in academia where these discussions do go on, or in meetings at publishing houses, where suddenly, historical fiction has become bifurcated by sex: men write historical adventure, and women write female driven personal drama. The glory days of Mary Renault and Marguerite Yourcenar, who I daresay influenced all of us, are long behind us!

KE: Chris, Margaret, do you think that this idea of writing according to one’s own sex is reader-driven or publisher-driven? And do you think that this “branding” is constructive in either the marketing sense or the creative sense, or does it limit our creativity? Have you gotten feedback from your readers on these issues?

MG: I think the publishers are responding to what they imagine readers think. This recent distrust of having a narrator who isn’t a member of the group he/she is speaking for may have started with the academic ‘gender studies’ programs that were so fiercely defensive about turf. Women’s Studies in particular seemed angry that men had written in the female voice. They seemed to feel it was another example of being taken over by men, silenced by them, exploited by them. From there it spread out into the idea that no one except a woman had a right to write as a woman. Earlier it had been blacks and whites, gays and straights, and also actors portraying anyone other than their own group that were frowned upon. I was told I couldn’t write about Alexander the Great because I wasn’t gay, but at the time no one objected to my writing as a man, only as a gay man.

KE: I remember having a fierce argument in graduate school with a lecturer who put forth the politically correct argument that one could only write accurately from one’s own gender/race point of view. I stood up and said that I thought that Anna Karenina and Madame Bovary were pretty good portraits of women, though written by men. She actually disagreed. And yet I must say that the lack of women’s stories written in women’s voices throughout history has been a motivating factor in my writing. Margaret, I think we may be two of the only women who have told K(C)leopatra’s story from the female point of view! And that’s in the scope of 2000 years. And our portraits of her definitely rescue her from the old “she was nothing but a seductress” stereotype. So we have to give some validation to the idea of women telling women’s stories (finally!). And yet I would hate to see literature become limited to that construct.

MG: Until recently, the [publishing] industry seemed less defensive about a woman writing as a man, perhaps because men didn’t complain about it. People were more puzzled than anything else that I would want to write as Henry VIII, because they didn’t think we had anything in common. As if being human with human appetites and failings isn’t having something in common! Men have told me they did not have trouble accepting the voice as a man’s, and as Henry’s. I figure, a man would know if I didn’t sound like a man, right?

It certainly isn’t constructive in the creative sense (“stick with your own kind” is pretty restrictive) and it’s a lazy sort of marketing device. But people like brands and want to identify an author with a certain sort of product. I remember when John le Carre wrote a love story. But the readers didn’t want love from le Carre, they wanted spies! And Anne Rice switching from vampires to Jesus…well, it’s unsettling for readers. She probably lost most of her old regulars and picked up a new crowd. I think, compared to switching genres, switching genders (pun unintentional) is a lesser sin in the publishing world.

CWG: I think to a certain extent that both [publishers and readers] are driving the trend. Publishers provide what readers buy, and I have heard throughout the years that some readers prefer books written by their own gender. I think gender interests come into play, as well: men tend to gravitate to the fast-paced thriller / adventure stories and women tend to prefer personalized dramas. However, it is totally without merit to even suggest that this is always true. On the contrary, I think many readers cross over into different genres and often don't care about the author's gender as long as the story is well told. However, with the ongoing success of the first-person female POV in historical fiction, now I believe we're starting to see an emphasis on this POV being required. I think "branding" in this fashion can be very limiting, in that it does curtail the breadth of stories we might want to tell. It basically cancels out the perspective of half the population if you cannot tell a story from, say, the male POV.

KE: I know! The only objection I have to my book covers is that they are so darned “pretty” and so strongly marketed to women that no man would be caught dead carrying one up to the cashier at a bookstore. And yet men always like my books because they are full of two things that men generally like—sex and history!

CWG: I recently had this discussion with another author; I mentioned a book I wanted to write about feuding medieval kings who were half-brothers and the immediate response was: "Do you have a female POV to tell it through?" It's becoming the rule, rather than the method you as the author arrive at as the best way to tell your story. I believe that the story should dictate the POV or gender in which you choose to write. As writers we should be invisible; that's one of the marvels of our craft: to become our characters and lose ourselves. Even more so than actors, as we can, by writing, be of another gender or even a different species. Sharon Penman, one of my new writer friends and an amazing talent, summed it up quite nicely this way: Imagine if editors had told Richard Adams, "But you're not a rabbit! How can you write from an animal's perspective?" We would never have had WATERSHIP DOWN.

What I mostly get as feedback from my readers is praise that they couldn't tell a man had written THE LAST QUEEN. I've also had a few tell me they knew at once and I got it all wrong, but that's to be expected. You can't please everyone.

KE: Well having read your book, I can tell you that you didn’t get anything “wrong!” It was amazing, and it haunted me for weeks. When I am writing in the male voice, I do try to put on a man’s thinking cap. I’ve spent so much of my life trying to understand men that I feel I have a right to write from their points of view! And I do try to apply what I have learned. Men are much more direct than women, and they do tend to literally mean what they say (exception: when trying to get a woman into bed). Women tend to be more indirect and begin sentences with “I think” and “Maybe.” We are also more cunning. So that when I write male and female dialogue, I am coming from different perspectives. Do either of you have special techniques that you use, or things that you keep in mind, or do special research when you write in a voice that is the “other” gender?

MG: I try to really get inside their heads and think as they think; their slant due to their gender is part of that. If I know their actions then sometimes they fit into a pattern common to that gender, sometimes not. For example, I’m not sure about the ‘never asking for directions’ earmark of being male. Henry VIII didn’t seem to mind asking for directions, but then he didn’t feel obligated to follow them. Was that a ‘male’ trait, or was it a ‘royal’ trait? In his case it was often hard to tell. And of course all these characters have their own idiosyncrasies that may vary from the regular sex stereotypes. Henry really liked to dress up; he was totally into clothes. (Female?) On the other hand, he was also into technology. (Male?)

CWG: I employ basic acting techniques in which I focus on divesting myself of my conscious self, my ego, in order to "inhabit" my character. It can take time, and several drafts, before I find that space or voice; but I have found that with effort I can usually "become" the character I'm writing and see the world through her eyes. What I'm always very careful about is not to inject my personal sensibilities or reactions into my character, but rather allow her to react as she should, according to who she is. There were instances, for example, in THE LAST QUEEN when I didn't necessarily agree with the way Juana handled herself; nevertheless, she did behave as she was envisioned as a character. It sounds complicated when I try to explain it, but in truth the process itself can be very organic and natural to me as a writer.

KE: I think that’s a very important point. So often we, the authors, do not approve of what a character is doing or wants to do, but if we impose our own value system on them, they cease to be who they are and just become less interesting mini-me’s.I’m dealing now with a protagonist who insisted on starting out much more conservative than I wanted her to be. What can you do but listen to them?

CWG: As far as special research goes, there are certain aspects of being a woman I did have to talk to girlfriends about: the feeling of being pregnant, for one, as well as the sensations of giving birth. I also, for THE LAST QUEEN, did some "field research:' I borrowed a Renaissance gown from a friend who performs re-enactment and tried it on for an hour or so, to get a feel for its weight and how the body feels when covered by such heavy layers of fabric. I discovered your movements become more slow and cautious, thereby revealing the vaunted elegance of Renaissance women, which was something I wouldn't have necessarily known had I not worn the dress.

KE: While we are talking about limits, can we also talk about locale? Many writers of historical fiction get branded not only by gender, but by period and location. Writers are advised to stick with one period and one country. Is this marketing, or is this because readers have very specific interests and obsessions?

MG: I would say “both.” After Henry VIII, I had wanted to do Cleopatra and was told by a publisher, “Oh no, that’s not your period!” That struck me as odd because I had only written one book. They went on to warn me that writing about different periods or settings would dilute my ‘brand’ and if I wrote about too many of them, I’d have no ‘brand’ at all.

After six books, written in two time periods, (ancient and Tudor) I’d say that you can do two and maybe three, but if you try to do more you will be perceived as not having much expertise in any of them, more like a journalist who flits from the Kennedys to the Great Wall of China to the Inquisition without much depth. The faster the books are written, and the closer together they are published, the stronger this impression will be, for it takes time to master material in any meaningful way.

I was also warned that you don’t necessarily carry your readers with you when you change time periods. I think that’s true to some extent. There are readers who are loyal to one time period but don’t have much interest in others. At the same time it’s fun to meet a new population of readers. The “Helen of Troy” crowd was different from the “Henry VIII” crowd, although there was some overlap.

CWG: I think in the US in particular there is a significant emphasis on England and the Tudor / Plantagenet eras. I think marketing does come into play: readers get excited to discover a certain time period through a particular author and will want to read more, explore more deeply, along with that writer. However, certain time periods can become oversaturated (see "Tudors") and while I understand there is tremendous interest in the era, I for one start to get impatient if that is all that's being offered to me as a reader. I'm by nature very interested in world history and there are so many fantastic places and characters to write about, I just can't see myself being limited to one. For now, my focus is on the later medieval and renaissance periods, but I want to be able to wander if I find a story that compels me. Certain writers "branded" themselves in one era, and do it splendidly, book after book. Personally, I would find it confining as a writer, though from the publishing perspective I can see how this branding can help build a career.

KE: I, too, would find it confining. I know that as an author, it is equally important to keep myself entertained as it is to entertain the reader. I practically get a Ph.D in every period I write about, but that is because the research is truly edifying for me. On some days I wish I could be the sort who takes one period and writes 25 books about it. Oh, how much easier my life would be! On the other hand, I think we have to follow our own creative drives and desires or what we produce will not be exciting to either us or to the readers.

KE: Margaret, you pioneered the Tudor craze in historical fiction with your book about Henry and Mary Queen of Scotland & The Isles (1997). Now it’s the most popular period for readers of historical fiction. After digressing to Egypt, Israel, and Troy, you are returning to it with your new book about Elizabeth I, which you’ve just finished. What made you return to the Tudors?

MG: Elizabeth was always ‘the elephant in the room’ in my mind, the remaining legendary Tudor who needed to join the others on my bookshelf. But---hence the elephant analogy---she was so big. Not actually, but historically. She was such an icon, in some ways appearing not even human, with her gigantic ruffs and stiff, galleon-like bejeweled costumes that transformed her into an idol for public appearances. She reigned for so long---44 years---and so much happened during her reign. I just didn’t see how it was possible to encompass all that within a book that didn’t need a wheelbarrow to carry. Publishers are more and more concerned about length, and readers want shorter books as well. That seemed a contradiction in terms with Elizabeth.

Finally I realized that I had already covered her childhood in The Autobiography of Henry VIII and her middle years in Mary Queen of Scotland and the Isles. So I could start after that, in 1587, and go forward. This still made for a regular-sized book. The later part of her life is what we think of when we hear the word “Elizabethan”: the Armada, the Tilbury Speech (“ I know I have the body but of a weak and feeble woman, but I have the heart and stomach of a king and of a king of England, too”), Shakespeare, the Earl of Essex, Sir Francis Drake, Sir Walter Ralegh’s Virginia colony, and so on.

KE: I know that for myself, when I get an idea for a novel, it starts to literally heat up inside me like some kind of electricity. It’s a force and an energy that I couldn’t stop if I wanted to because its locale isn’t my “brand.” I’m leaping into the late Victorian period and into the gothic and the occult for my next book, but it’s because I literally couldn’t stop myself from writing the story. It’s in a female voice and it’s an historical novel, but still, it’s a departure for me. Luckily, I have an amazing publisher who says, “you go, girl.” And I hope that readers will follow. I think that every artist throughout time has had to balance creative instincts with the marketplace. It’s nothing new!

KE: Christopher, you are half-Spanish and completely bi-lingual, not to mention schooled in Spanish history. But your next novel is about Catherine de Medici. Tell us a little bit about your leap to another country, and also, if you are planning to return to telling a Spain-based story any time soon?

CWG: As I said before, I do like to wander. After 16th century France and Catherine de Medici, I'm hoping to write about a woman in early 15th century Italy during the rise of the Borgias, then, if I'm lucky, I'd like to return to Spain, but in the latter-half of the 16th century Spain, in the court of Philip II. After that, who knows? I've always had a hankering for ancient Egypt . . .

KE: Which brings you around to turf that Margaret and I have already trodden upon, so that seems a great full-circle sort of place to end our discussion. Thanks a million to both of you for joining in.