Lesbian Fiction
Date Published: October 2019
Anne Elliot broke off her relationship with Freddie Wentworth when her family didn't approve. Almost eight years later, Freddie re-materializes in her life. She's a captain in the Air Force, successful, single, and as beautiful as ever. Mortified that she doesn't have much to show for the intervening years, Anne tries to avoid her. When contact is inevitable, her life is turned upside down. Self-doubt becomes self-improvement, old wounds are reopened and then allowed to heal, and true friends and true love win in the end.
Interview with Jeanette Watts
As a writer, what would you choose as your mascot/avatar/spirit
animal?
Well, I’ve been saying for
years that in my next reincarnation I’m coming back as a river otter. Have you
ever seen an animal that looks like they are having as much fun as the otters
are?
How many hours a day do you put into your writing?
If I were doing it right, I
would have a regular schedule… I am also a dance instructor and a costumer and
an actress. So some days, zero. Other days, 10 hours. When I’m on a roll, I
hate to stop. I also don’t know how to count the hours when I write at the
sewing machine. I will write until I need to think, then I will think while I
sew. Then when I’m done thinking and I know how I want to say the next thing, I
stop sewing and start writing again. This was how I wrote most of my first
novel – which I did longhand, with a spiral notebook next to the sewing
machine.
Do you read your book reviews?
Sometimes? I mostly forget
about the existence of book reviews. I remember to get on Amazon occasionally,
but to be honest, I usually get really great reviews, and I don’t want all the
nice things going to my head. I don’t need to become an egomaniac or something.
I got really excited one time
when I got this bad review because the reader didn’t like my main character. It
was proof that I did it right. No one universally loves every single human
being. If my characters are believable, and they seem like real people, there
SHOULD be people out there who don’t like them.
Do you leave hidden messages in your books that only a few
people will find?
I guess I would call them in
jokes more than I’d call them hidden messages. In my new release, I have Walter
Elliot talking about the Midwest with such horror. My friends keep commenting
on that. I’m a Midwestern girl, I have lots of Midwestern friends, and this
amuses all of us mightily.
Can you tell us a little bit about the characters in A Woman’s Persuasion?
This novel is a faithful retelling
of Jane Austen’s Persuasion. So all
the characters are a modern translation of the characters in the original. The
heroine, Anne, is overlooked and taken for granted. Wow, I just realized I have
a fondness for that sort of character: that absolutely describes the hero of my
first novel, Wealth and Privilege.
Thank you, I just learned something about myself I didn’t know.
Anne is surrounded by family
members who tend to be very self-absorbed. Her father, Walter Elliot, is
particularly delicious to write about; he is sort of the man you love to hate,
no matter what era the story takes place in. Her sisters obviously take after
her father, and even well-meaning friends of the family are thinking more about
their own priorities, and don’t give guidance to this young woman that have her
best interests at heart.
Can you tell us a little bit about your next books or what you have
planned for the future?
There are always so many! Just
before I got the idea to write A Woman’s
Persuasion, I had started writing another historic fiction novel that I
really want to return to. It’s set in New York at the turn of the twentieth century.
I really want to get back to that. The main characters are historic figures,
one well known, one almost completely lost to history. When the story is about
a woman with a secret, how can I resist? But then a friend pointed out that I
need to do a particular retelling of Pride
and Prejudice set in junior high school. I’m being tempted.
Do you allow yourself a certain number of hours to write or do you
write as long as the words come?
So, do I
binge or do I keep to a steady diet? I’m definitely a binger, just because of
the demands upon my time. I would write so much more every day if there wasn’t
dancing in the universe. But I adore my dance students, and it’s unthinkable to
give up the time I spend teaching them to dance. Writing always feels like a
selfish thing to me. It’s my quality time I spend with myself. I do it when I
can, for as long as I can. I will write until my eyeballs tell me it’s three in
the morning, please, please can we go to sleep?
Do you have a certain number of words or pages you write per day?
No, I
would just write the entire book without ever sleeping or eating, if only I
physically could.
What inspires you to write?
My brain hates me and sends me
these ideas, and gives me no rest until I do something about it. Sometimes
these ideas are dance related: “Hey, we should throw a Victorian Christmas
ball!” Or “Hey, eight of us have these Renaissance costumes, let’s do a Renaissance
suite of dances for the local international festival!” Other times, these ideas
are books. I need to write a children’s book about the angel who lives
downstairs. It will be a tribute to my old landlord when we lived in
Pittsburgh. The man was my guardian angel, and he passed away recently. I also
have an idea for erotic fiction. I read Fifty
Shades of Gray, and thought, “If this can get published, I should be
writing out my idea!” Inspiration can come from anywhere, and it always does,
and I just try to keep up with it. Sadly, that’s not possible, and many
inspirations get lost.
Would you rather
Read fiction or
non-fiction?
Non-fiction! I adore biographies. I actually read very little
fiction.
Read series or
stand-alone?
My favorite science fiction is a little-known Anne McCaffrey
novel called Restoree, which is a
stand-alone. My favorite historical fiction is Gone With the Wind. And biographies are not generally series. Although
I do love Shelby Foote’s Civil War
books, and there are three of them. So, mostly stand-alone books.
Read Science fiction
or horror?
Science fiction, definitely. I’m not much of one for horror
at all. I grew up on Isaac Asimov’s Foundation
Trilogy, and while Restoree is
one of my favorite Anne McCaffrey books, I do love all the Dragonriders of Pern books.
Read Stephen King or
Dean Koontz
Neither.
Read the book or
watch the movie?
OMG read the book! I mean, come on, have you watched the
Harry Potter movies? You know, where we have dragon chases that aren’t in the
books, but we can barely mention the Marauder’s Map?
Read an ebook or
paperback?
I will say, I prefer a book in my hand.
Be trapped alone for
one month in a library with no computer or a room with a computer and Wi-Fi
only?
Okay, that one is exactly 50-50. I would be fine with either
one. If I had to read in a library for a month, that would be no hardship. If I
had to surf online for a month, that would still be no hardship. It would be an
excuse to get all kinds of research done! So much is available online these
days that wasn’t when I was researching my first novel.
Do a cross-country
book store tour or blog tour online?
I’ll take the travel option, please! Besides the fact that I
love to travel, and I’ve just applied for a job as a flight attendant, I also
love people. So meeting readers face to face, as opposed to answering their
queries online, is awesome. I’ll take face to face time with people!
About the Author:
Jeanette Watts was happily writing historical fiction when she got the idea for her first Jane Austen-inspired novel, Jane Austen Lied to Me. Going to a JASNA event to work on selling that book, she attended a lecture that asked, "Why does everyone rewrite Pride and Prejudice so much more than her other novels? Why doesn't anyone rewrite Persuasion?"
So she had to...
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1 comments:
thanks for hosting
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