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First, tell me about
The Lady and the Luddite. How did you come to write it?
I was a Georgette Heyer addict; and when I'd finished all hers, I read other people's Regency Romances. But I got bored with all those aristocratic grey-eyed heroes with cynical smiles: I wanted to write something with a good working-class hero. In the Regency period, the working-class heroes were the Luddites: the skilled men who were being put out of work by machines. In those days, they couldn't vote, it was illegal to form a trade union, and there was no unemployment pay. So these men did the only thing they could: they picked up their hammers and they smashed the machines. I took a Luddite as my hero, and a heroine that you might meet in a Regency Romance, and I put them together and let things rip.
I'm very happy that the book is now coming out with Pan Macmillan. It was first published as a hardback by Robert Hale in London, and that's the format in which it was shortlisted for the 2001 RBOTY Award. But now it's available in paperback, so people can afford it rather than chase it up in their local libraries. And Pan Macmillan have done a great job with it.
You live in a very remote part of Australia, Humpty Doo, in the Northern Territory. Are there any difficulties with living so far away from anywhere else - especially if you're writing about the Yorkshire moors?
Mainly the lack of big bookshops and libraries, and also the chance to exchange ideas with other people face-to-face. But the Internet makes it possible to stay in touch, to find out information, and to order books from all over the world. It's funny: the word `Luddite' means nowadays someone who doesn't like modern technology, especially computers. But I couldn't manage without. So although my hero is a Luddite, I'm not.
Here's me in Humpty Doo writing about the Yorkshire moors, and perhaps there's someone in Yorkshire who's writing about the Australian outback. Maybe one day we can get together!
How many books have you written?
The Lady and the Luddite was the first published: another one,
The Major's Minion, came out last year, though I wrote it earlier, and a third,
Freedom in my Love is due out in April; both of those are with Robert Hale. I've got another one with my agent right now, and I'm working on a fifth. I hope to write a book a year: I'm a mainstream author, not category romance, so I don't have the pressure to write several a year.
Where do you get your ideas?
I can have half a dozen ideas before breakfast. The ones that last through coffee are worth doing something with. I've never had any difficulty coming up with ideas: I've got dozens of sketches of novels on my computer, and if anyone wants one of them, just let me know!
It's coming up with good ideas that's the problem. But sometimes - just sometimes - I hear the muse talking, and I know that this is the one.
My muse is very fickle and unpredictable. She talked to me about
The Lady and the Luddite when I was going round an old house in England that is the original of Fieldhead in the novel, which seems appropriate. But at other times she's talked to me when I'm on the loo.
Are you writing under your own name or a pseudonym?
It's my maiden name.
How long were you writing before being published?
I've been writing since primary school, and I've had a fair number of short stories published over the years, but as a serious effort - in the sense that I gave up other work and settled down to write novels - it took only about six months before I signed the first contract with Robert Hale.
What were the most important things you learned in your early years of writing?
At primary school? Reading and writing are fun!
Later on, I learned the craft: how to put stories together. And just recently I've accepted the fact that, to write well, you have to expose your nerves. I'm a fairly private person by nature, but I now know that I have to dig deep into my unconscious and my dreams in order to give the stories the oomph. You've got to write from both the heart and the head.
What is most important to you as a romance writer?
I hope you don't mind, but I'm going to pick you up on that question. I've come to the conclusion that I'm not a romance writer, and I want to acknowledge Anne Gracie for this. (If you're reading this, Anne, my thanks - it was the best advice about romance writing I've ever had.) We were at the last RWA conference, and we had a conversation that went something like this:
Anne: What are you writing at the moment?
Me: One about the French Revolution. My publisher has rejected it, and I'm hoping to pick up a few tips here so as to give it a bit more oomph before I show it to him again.
Anne: What's it about?
Me: It's based on a true story: `Can the heroine save the great scientist from the guillotine?'
Anne: Sounds good: why doesn't your publisher like it?
Me: Well, she can't.
Anne: [Long pause] You mean your hero gets his head chopped off at the end?
Me: That's right.
Anne: Linden, you have a problem. That is NOT a romance.
I protested, saying that one of the most romantic endings in fiction is
Tale of Two Cities, where the hero sacrifices his life to save the husband of the woman he loves and climbs the steps of the guillotine saying, `It's a far, far better thing'. Other people at the conference joined in the discussion, and I've been thinking about it ever since.
This is my answer: I don't write romances, I write love stories. What's the difference? In a romance, the reader is safe. She knows that the hero and heroine will be united at the end and live happily ever after. But a love story isn't safe. Maybe there'll be a happy ending - and maybe there won't. Because love isn't safe, is it?
What are you working on now?
Another one about the French Revolution. There's so much misinformation about it: I want to get it right. But at the same time I want to tell a good story: I work hard on combining the two. So I'm hoping to write something that's as gripping as
The Scarlet Pimpernel, but much more accurate.
Is your writing still evolving?
I hope so! I'd hate to think that I've already written my best book. I'm gaining the courage and skills to tackle the tough issues. After all, a novel where the hero gets his head chopped off poses a few problems, doesn't it? But I've tackled them, and I think it's the best book I've written so far: I only hope my agent agrees with me.
Does writing get any easier?
The main way it's become easier for me is that now I can go along to complete strangers and say, `I'm an author, and I'd like your help with the research for my next novel.' You have to get published to get the cred.
Is writing your full-time job?
Yes. I don't get anything like a full-time wage from novel writing itself, so I do other things, like commercial editing and teaching creative writing.
How long does it take you to write a new story, idea conception to finish?
The Major's Minion took ten years. Freedom in my Love took four weeks.
How did your first sale come about? How did you feel hearing those magic words?
My first real success was in the eighties, when one of my short stories won first prize in a contest run by `Family Circle'. I had a phone call from the editor in the middle of the afternoon, and I thought, `Oh, that's nice.' It took me about ten minutes before it sank in and I rushed round the room shouting.
What happened to those rejected manuscripts?
Every time I change computers I look at the ones on the hard disk, and decide whether they are worth shifting over to the next one. There are a lot of stories that haven't been worth it, and they have gone to electronic Nirvana.
Who are your influences in writing?
Jane Austen, Paul Jennings, and Dick Francis. This might seem an odd combination, but all three of them are wonderful story-tellers. In Jane Austen's
Emma, nothing much happens: the climax is no more than a conceited young lady being rude to a middle-aged spinster - but it has you on the edge of your seat! Paul Jennings, who writes very Australian books for children about things like a haunted dunny, says that there is no such thing as a reluctant reader: there are only children who haven't been shown a good story. And Dick Francis has been writing practically the same story for thirty years; you know just what's going to happen, and yet the latest one still keeps you awake all night until you finish it.
Tell me about when you held your first book in your hands.
I had a lot of work on at the time, and yet I sat down and read it all the way through, and then I read it all over again.
Are you a reader?
I'm a bookaholic. I keep a book in the glove compartment of my car to read in traffic jams.
When not writing, how do you spend your time?
I live on a two-hectare block, so often I just go out and look at it. Occasionally I feel the urge to plant something, and sometimes I give into it.
Since your acceptance for publication, how has writing changed for you?
It's given me the confidence to persist through the bad times, when my muse isn't talking to me and nobody's accepting my work. I've succeeded before, and I know I can do it again.
Tell me about a typical day in your writing life
There's no typical day for me. I've tried the disciplined thing of sitting down and conscientiously writing my 3000 words a day, and every time, I've got about 40,000 words through, and thought, `This is sh*t', and given up: I have a lot of half-written books on my computer. I need the muse talking to me to write anything worth the effort. When she's there, I can write a complete first draft of a novel in a matter of weeks, and I do nothing else: my husband has to wave his hand in front of me to get me to eat, sleep, or talk to him. When the muse is not speaking, I don't sit around doing nothing waiting for her: I do some research, edit someone else's book, run creative writing classes, or even do a bit of gardening.
How much work do you do before writing in research and planning?
In research, I do a lot. I take a pride in getting my facts right - there are far too many historical novels which gets things wrong. And not just the facts: I spend a long time trying to get into the heads of people in the past, and working out ways in which the ways they thought and felt can be translated for the modern reader.
In planning, I usually sketch out a five-act synopsis, so I know roughly where the story is heading and what should happen when. But often I don't stick to it, because something better occurs to me as I'm writing.
What are your ambitions in your future writing?
They keep shifting, and I've achieved some of them. First it was to get a short story published, then it was a novel, and now I've satisfied another one, which is to see my own work as a mass-market paperback on the shelves in ordinary bookshops. The next ambition is to earn a living by writing: to get as much from royalties as I would if I had a hair cut and got a real job. After that? Well, J K Rowling isn't doing badly, is she? But really, they all boil down to one thing: I want to write stories that other people want to read.
What aspects of RWAustralia have helped your development as a writer?
It's taught me to respect the skills of romance writers. I have a confession: I used to say - like a lot of people say - `Oh, anyone can write one of those.' But now I know that it's much more difficult than it seems to introduce the hero and heroine in the first chapter, unite them in the last chapter, and keep the reader interested for all the chapters in between.
And to do this when you've got to keep the hero and heroine on the page all the time? In my novels, I can bring in the French Revolution when things are getting a bit slack. I
couldn't manage what category romance writers do. And to do it several times a year? Wow!
What do you think an author needs to be successful?
Three things: talent, persistence, and a good agent. Luck helps, but if you've got the other three, sooner or later you'll make it.
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The
Lady and the Luddite