Transcript
[00:00:00] Katherine Grant: Welcome to the Historical Romance Sampler Podcast. I'm your host, Katherine Grant, an award winning historical romance author, and each week I am bringing on a different historical romance author to read a little bit of their work so you can sample it, and then for me to interview them to find out more about how they do what they do.
But since this is our special first episode, who I have with me today is not a historical romance author, but my very special, wonderful, loving, and supportive husband, Michael. And so what we're gonna do today is I'm gonna be the featured author and I will read from my work, The Viscount Without Virtue.
And then Michael is going to interview me with all the burning questions he's never asked me. So thanks for joining us, and let's get into the episode. So I'm going to read from the Viscount Without Virtue, which is book one in the Preston series. I partly chose this because I know it's One of your favorite books.
[00:00:55] Michael : It is my favorite book of yours.
[00:00:58] Katherine Grant: So in the Viscount Without [00:01:00] Virtue, the Preston family has realized that all of their aristocratic wealth comes from colonial imports and wealth from exploiting enslaved people. And so about 20, 30 years ago, the family decided to divest and they set up their estate as kind of a regency commune.
They only live off the land, and they welcome anyone to come live on the estate, including people who have felony records and who otherwise wouldn't be welcome in British society. And everyone who lives and works on the land shares the profits of the estate. And so in the Viscount Without Virtue, Max, the Viscount, shows up because he thinks this is It's pretty strange, way too radical, and he is determined to write an exposé proving that Northfield Hall is not as idyllic as it says.
He's pretty sure there must be some underhanded See the world there. aNd so to do this, he is posing [00:02:00] undercover as a man of all work who is back from Australia, and he somehow manages to get himself a job in the Northfield Hall Carpentry Workshop. The other person who works at the Northfield Hall Carpentry Workshop is Ellen Preston, the eldest daughter of the Preston family.
She's very interested in being hands on and knowing everyone on the estate, and she loves doing her carpentry. And so she has to share her tools with Max, and she is not thrilled about this because she can tell he doesn't know what he's doing. But she's also very attracted to him, and he is very attracted to her, and so sparks are flying.
So, the scene that I'm going to read is he, Max has been there for a couple of weeks. He has discovered that being a commoner is a lot of hard work. He's currently working on helping to saw timber. So they have like a big tree trunk and they're trying to saw it into planks. And 13 year old assistant Oliver Chow is very unhappy.
When Max's hand [00:03:00] slipped, Oliver let out a great string of curses. First in Chinese and then in English. Ending with, Why do I have to work with a child? The Viscount in Max wanted to snarl back. He tempered that, and huffed out as politely as he could, I apologize. The youth glared at him. Why are you even here?
You don't know the first thing about carpentry. If he had to respond to that, Max just might quit the report altogether. He climbed from the pit instead, ignoring Oliver's question. I need water. Miss Preston, he noticed, was watching the exchange from her work table inside the shop, where she patiently chiseled a shutter pull into its proper shape.
She looked down quickly, as if she did not want to be caught. Max rattled the water pitcher noisily against the cup as he poured himself a drink. If he had to suffer through pure manual labor, he at least wanted to keep Miss Preston's attention. My father thinks you are a thief, [00:04:00] Oliver said from his seat on the timber.
Oh, does he? Max considered this. On the one hand, he wasn't fool enough to think Mr. Chow believed he had any experience in carpentry. On the other, he didn't want anyone wondering about where he had come from or why he was at Northfield Hall. Why haven't I stolen anything yet, then? Oliver clearly hadn't considered this and pulled an answer out of thin air.
Perhaps you're waiting for the new moon so you can sneak into the house in the dark and slit everyone's throats. Really, Oliver. Miss Preston shook her head, readjusting the clamp of her vice. Max expected her to chastise the boy's manners, but instead she said, Then he would be a thief and a murderer. Max smiled.
He couldn't help it. She was funny. Gulping down the water, he refilled the cup and sauntered over to her table. It is true that I am a thief. Setting the cup beside her, he winked. However, I am only here to steal Miss Preston's heart. [00:05:00] She rolled her eyes. Her cheeks were already flushed from the heat, so Max couldn't quite tell if she flushed, too.
But he liked to think she did. Before Oliver could respond, Spencer ran up to the workshop. Oliver, Father wants to show you how to frame the floor. With less enthusiasm, he said to Max, You're to stay here and help Miss Preston with the shutters. An order Max could accept with no qualms. He waited for Oliver and Spencer to disappear onto the path to the cottage site, then turned to his instructors.
I am at your service, Miss Preston. Her eyes, he noticed, had roamed downwards, examining the sweat soaking through his coat, perhaps, admiring the wrinkle of his muscles, he hoped. You may remove your jacket if you like. Now her cheeks definitely blazed. It is too hot to stand on ceremony. Max could have taken that opening and turned it into something naughty and delicious.
Invite her to strip to her [00:06:00] smock, or offer to remove as many clothes as she liked. He restrained himself to a mere eyebrow raise and shrugged out of his coat. He hung it on a peg beside one of the saws. He removed his necktie, too, so that he wore only his waistcoat and shirt above his torso. Still too many clothes, but his skin breathed a little easier with fewer layers.
Miss Preston pretended not to watch him. She stripped off her leather work gloves to take up the cup of water. Max noticed the strength in her fingers as they flashed through the air. In a ballroom, they would look mannish. In the workshop, they were competent. She drank the water in long, slow sips. Her eyes closed with pleasure.
Her throat moved in greedy gulps. When she finished, her tongue darted out to lick a stray bead of water from her lips. Never had Max found a simple act so arousing. This time, when their eyes met, Miss Preston didn't flush. She held his gaze, and an [00:07:00] eyebrow tilted in a challenge. One Max recognized. He could kiss her, if he wanted to.
Max retreated to the stool beside the work table. You did not join your father in London. No. Miss Preston returned her attention to the chisel. Lightly, as if there was no chemistry fizzling between them, she added, I am not interested in the marriage mart at the moment. And of course there is no other reason for a woman such as myself to go to London.
Of course. Max did wonder about her marriage prospects. Lord Preston carried enough of a reputation himself. His daughters would be limited to the Whigs, who didn't mind a radical in the family. Max couldn't imagine any of his peers offering for Miss Preston if they discovered her interest in carpentry.
They would take one look at the wood shavings clinging to her cuffs and leave the room. Their loss, of course. Max wasn't sure he could imagine Miss Preston in an evening gown, much less recognize her in one. She wouldn't [00:08:00] be herself without a block of wood in her hand. There are the shutters to complete anyway, he continued.
I've been meaning to ask, by the way, how you became such an expert joiner. Surely Lord and Lady Preston did not encourage such a hobby. I am useful to Northfield Hall. Papa has no objection to that. Miss Preston adjusted her position to better angle her chisel against the wood. Martin Chow began his apprenticeship here a decade ago now, and since he is like an older brother to me, I followed him.
Curiosity at first, I suppose, and then very quickly I found it much more interesting than anything in the schoolroom. Max had been curious about carpentry, too. Only when his father had discovered him following the workers about, the Earl had set Max to twice as many hours with his tutors, and lectured the groundsman on letting the heir do common tasks.
I have heard quite a few theories about you, Miss Preston said, chipping away at her chisel. Mrs. Chow thinks you are a common [00:09:00] criminal who is too afraid to admit what felony you committed. Others speculate you are a spy, here to uncover how Northfield Hall is so profitable. My brother Nate is convinced you are a pirate who has followed a treasure map to our property.
Pausing, she lifted an eyebrow at Max. Nate is taken with all things to do with the Navy, I'm afraid. He tried to project confidence. Nonchalance, even. Mr. Sims would not be alarmed by such accusations because he knew he had done nothing wrong. He was only an ex criminal trying to earn enough money to return to Norwich.
To which theory do you subscribe? Max heard how his tongue didn't quite sound calm. There was a defensiveness in it. Miss Preston paused, chisel hovering over her wood, to reply, I should like to believe you tell the truth, Mr. Sims. That is the magic of Northfield Hall, after all. We believe in each other, and forgive each other our sins.
Of course, [00:10:00] that is easier to do if we know what each other's sins are. As if Max would confess his black heart to her, simply because she asked. He scoffed. Is that it? I thought the magic of Northfield Hall was money in everyone's greedy little palms. Now Miss Preston set down her tool altogether. I have agitated you.
No, but she had. And since she had noticed, Max had to do something about it. Find some excuse for why her line of questioning upset him, without getting anywhere near the truth. I do believe you, Mr. Sims. There is nothing sinister in claiming to have some carpentry experience in order to get a job. I dare say I would lie too, if I needed wages in a scrape.
I was only teasing when I mentioned what everyone else was thinking. She was too good hearted for him. Max hated to have her believe the best in him. One day, she would discover the truth, that he had been lying to her this whole time. And he hated to think she was willingly blindfolding herself to the hints everyone else saw.[00:11:00]
At the very least, he didn't want her to feel a fool for flirting with him. You have not agitated me, Miss Preston, he reiterated. It is only that I do have something to confess to you. A transgression for which I hope you might forgive me. Oh, one word rippled between them. She swallowed, her hands stilled in the midst of brushing shavings from the table onto the floor, and she looked at him in such a way that changed the temperature in the air.
Again, Max knew. He could kiss her. He could take her in his arms, lay her across the shutters, and relish in the sweet heat of her lips. If he wanted to. Which was why he had to confess this lie, tell her he was promised to another, because one day, soon, he hoped, Miss Preston would find out who Max really was.
It would be easier for both of them, if there was no kiss. He opened his mouth to confess to his fictional sweetheart. Except before he could speak, Miss [00:12:00] Preston slid from the work table and stepped before him. With him still on the stool, she was almost exactly the same height as him. It's only Before you do, I just, she grabbed him by the waistcoat, and instead of finishing her sentence, she kissed him.
[00:12:19] Michael : Alright, thanks, that was great.
[00:12:21] Katherine Grant: Thank you.
[00:12:22] Michael : Yeah, I really love that you read a section from Max's perspective. I think he's one of the most interesting characters you've ever written. He's so, uh, unlike other characters that you've written in that he's more of an alpha, and actually kind of a villain at the beginning of the book.
So, can you talk about what some of the challenges are in writing a character that is different from your day to day? Characters that you usually write.
[00:12:53] Katherine Grant: Hmm, I did set out to make Max as alpha as possible, which does not come naturally [00:13:00] to me. And so I did find him. Difficult to write and I remember with this book rewriting the first I really rewrote all parts of it many times Like the same general beats were happening, but I had different things like at some point I had their first kiss in the woods at some point.
I had their first kiss like in the middle of a Little near the well, I just, I really had to rewrite it a lot because I didn't completely understand when he would be vulnerable and when he needed to not be vulnerable. I think my instinct when I'm writing characters is that they know that they're vulnerable and they are not trying to hide that they're vulnerable or they are, my characters tend to trust each other a lot and Max doesn't trust very many people and so I had to Rewrite a lot of scenes where he was being too trusting and I had to kind of pull that back
[00:13:57] Michael : And the the initial decision, to make [00:14:00] him as alpha as possible where did that come from?
Was that did you see that as sort of necessary for the story that you wanted to tell?
[00:14:07] Katherine Grant: Well, I knew I wanted him to be the person investigating Northfield Hall. And I think the decision about the Alpha was a little bit of a creative challenge to myself because I had been writing enough historical romances at that point to discover that my natural tendency is cinnamon roll heroes, or at least heroes who are very vulnerable in their own point of view.
And whereas the alpha hero... everyone is a vulnerable person, but the alpha hero won't even admit it to themselves until, like, the end of the book. So, I think that was paired with, like, I knew that he was coming in with this, like, kind of villainous, And I think that was his goal of writing the report and being very arrogant and thinking that he knew it was right.
And so I think, I wanted to try writing an alpha hero and it [00:15:00] served this story to try it here.
[00:15:04] Michael : And it was very successful. Thank you. Do you think that like when you when you give yourself a bigger challenge do you end up feeling more satisfied with the work? That's kind of a leading question, but
[00:15:17] Katherine Grant: I think if I'm explicitly going in with a challenge, sometimes I'm less satisfied with the work because I'm more, I'm more like specific about what I wanted to do.
I do feel I enjoy writing more when I know I'm writing against. a specific question or creative challenge. So this past fall, I put out Three Nights with Her Husband, which is a novella. And for that, I set myself this creative challenge, I guess? Where I was only allowed to write about the road trip as it happened at night.
So there's nothing about their daytimes. I mean, there's a little, like, this is what happened in the daytime, but it's only a sentence or two. I couldn't have scenes set in the daytime. [00:16:00] And part of that was when I'm really in the midst of just drafting, sometimes it's easy to just be like, okay. What happened next?
Well, they woke up and then they had breakfast and just kind of like chronicling the day and then that's kind of a trap that I fall into. So it was a little bit to help me get out of that feeling like I was in that trap. And then that was very challenging. To have everything that needed to happen in these specific scenes and it also put a time frame on the story And I think that serves the story when you're just reading it because you know, it's three nights and so, you know, you have that in your head, but There's like a ticking bomb on the story timeline, but It helps me feel fresher and not that sometimes it's like, okay, now I need to sit down and write another story about people falling in love.
So when I have a creative challenge or a question like with the Prestons, each book is kind of a question about what does it mean to live with strong principles. So when I know what [00:17:00] that question is, it helps me think, okay, that's what I'm kind of curious about. And I'm using the metaphor of a romantic love story to explore that.
[00:17:11] Michael : Very interesting. Reminds me, so I think , I hear a lot about artists in different mediums being inspired by sort of constraints. I was watching an interview with the, the singer Caroline Polachek, who's one of my favorites right now. And she was talking about how she put all, imposed all these arbitrary constraints on herself on her new album.
Like she wanted to write a song that had orchestra hits that sounded sort of natural and without any irony. That was a difficult thing to pull off. I noticed that a lot in, in your writing how there's sort of the constraint of the romance genre needing to follow certain conventions, but the challenge of you know, you're telling stories from this new [00:18:00] perspective the, something like Northfield Hall is very unique I think.
Backing up a little bit, what, what is it that drew you to romance as a genre to begin with?
[00:18:12] Katherine Grant: I have always loved the love story in any media that I am consuming. Like, when, like, Disney movies. In any novel, I'm drawn to the love story. In any movie, I'm drawn to the love story. In any music, I'm always attuned to the lyrics that are about love stories.
Even like, going to tour historic places. Being interested in, okay, who fell in love here? It's always just been like a natural inclination for me. It's the thing that is most interesting to me. But for a long time, I felt that there was That it wasn't meaningful to write love stories. I felt that I needed to be writing more "important" things.
And [00:19:00] so I think, like, I started writing when I was, I wrote my first novel when I was 12. And in high school, the stories I was writing were very driven by love. And then in college, when I was studying creative writing formally, I felt that I could not have love in the stories. And it was a huge struggle to write because I didn't have the natural momentum.
But it wasn't until I was in my late 20s was when I really started reading romance. And then I still had this like, but I can't write that. Until I was You know, we've just gotten married and I had some, I've been in my day job for a while and I was feeling like I was at a point where I didn't have a lot of control over it and I was about to be kind of pushed onto a path that I didn't really want to be on.
And so I thought, well, maybe... with the romance category, you can be an independent author and have success and have control over your career. And so I, I knew that I could write a romance [00:20:00] because I love romances. And then I could pair it with a type of career that I want. So, I decided to try it.
[00:20:07] Michael : Cool. Yeah everyone loves a love story.
They, they are in everything as you said. But, yeah, there's this specific category of romance that gets treated differently. But Yeah, it's in most of the fiction that we enjoy. Yeah. What I, what I find really interesting about romance is somebody who has had very little exposure to the genre, pretty much only through you and through observing your interactions with the community and the things that you tell me about and reading your books.
I really like that the romance community loves to talk about tropes and like what, what are your favorite tropes? What tropes are in this book that I just read and every genre has tropes. Everything that you read is, is made up of tropes, but I think it's cool that you talk about it and [00:21:00] analyze it and that you
[00:21:06] Katherine Grant: Yeah, and sort of being like, Oh, I'm going to defy all these things and write the romance novel that's never been written. Yeah. That's not even what readers want. Readers want something that's predictable, which is one of my challenges.
[00:21:17] Michael : And you can still be creative while. faLling into the the formula or the tropes.
Even formula, I think, doesn't have to be a negative word.
[00:21:27] Katherine Grant: Right. Everything follows some sort of formula. Yeah. I think what you were saying before about artists setting themselves constraints. One thing that I love writing the romance genre is that it has this inherent formula and so this inherent constraint where, first of all, there needs to be a happily ever after, which I love.
Second of all. That, you know, we know there are going to be certain progressions throughout of when we'll see the characters kind of come together and [00:22:00] creatively that frees me. The writer, Olivia Waite, has written about how the romance novel. In other genres, each time a novel is written, the novel has to redefine itself and ask the question of what is this story?
What is the shape of the story? Where does the story end? And so with romance, you don't have to ask those questions because you know it, so you can free up that energy to ask different questions and explore different things. Yeah. And then in terms of setting constraints, I think about this with the show How I Met Your Mother.
I think they were very inventive in setting themselves. Constraints like the story where the pineapple up to two AM and I just feel like they were constantly being like, okay, we're going to tell this episode from a different story format and it kept things fresh. And I think in Buffy the Vampire Slayer you see that as well.
These are all created by Wesleyan alumni and you went to Wesleyan.
... .
I really do think there's some sort of like Wesleyan teaches [00:23:00] things that way. But I also. I'm stealing that idea because I think it provides for more longevity because you're still working within the ascribed format. For them, it's a TV episode.
For me, it's a romance novel, but I can find new ways to feel fresh and find new angles to it.
[00:23:19] Michael : Yeah, it's very interesting. Do you As you're preparing to write a story, or thinking about a story, do you think about like, the tropes or the specific story beats that you want to hit, or does that sort of arise as you're writing it?
[00:23:38] Katherine Grant: Every novel comes to me different. I do try to think about tropes. With my full length novels, I find it very difficult to say, I'm going to have this trope, and then actually stick to that. The Northfield Hall novellas are a little bit of a creative exercise for me, where I am saying it's going to be this trope, and like, I'll pick like two tropes, and then try to put that into the novella, and see if I can be successful at that.[00:24:00]
I think because I have a lot more going on in the novels, trying to add in a trope specifically, and hit that trope, and do something interesting with it, and do everything else I'm trying to do, Sometimes just makes it such a mess. With the Prestons, each sibling has a different orientation towards the family's lifestyle and beliefs.
And so my main question for each novel is, how does the sibling orient themselves, and how does that change, and what can that tell us about having strong principles, and is it necessary to live by principles, and can you be a good person without strong principles, and can you have two strong principles, and like, that's the like, big question of the series, and so each novel I'm trying to explore that through a different way.
So instead of tropes, that's kind of like the thing, but that said, when I was plotting out the series, I [00:25:00] did say, okay, this is like Nate's book and he's a sailor, so I want it to be kind of Persuasion inspired. And that means it's a second chance romance. And what can I add to this story? So I am interested in the heroine being.
In Persuasion, they go on and on about how Ann Elliot has lost the bloom of her youth. And so in my, I was curious, well, what if she actually isn't just 28 and doesn't look like an 18 year old anymore, but what if she actually has a chronic illness? so That was Those were, like, the things that I added that I knew from, like, before I started writing it, when I started, before I started writing the series, I set up that type of, I guess, a little bit of trope or character information for myself.
[00:25:46] Michael : And thanks for choosing a reference that I know. We recently watched Persuasion. Yes. So, you mentioned Buffy How I Met Your Mother what are some of your other Inspirations outside of romance?
[00:25:58] Katherine Grant: I think [00:26:00] everything that I'm consuming comes out somehow in my writing. Like for example, I just read, not just, but I recently read this pop psychology book from the 70s called Love and Limerence.
Which was one of the first psychological academic studies of what is it to be in love. Really, it was what is it to have a crush on a person. And so, reading that helped me write Letters to Her Love, which is a novella coming out in February. That is very strongly, these two people have a crush on each other, but one of them will admit it and one of them won't.
And so it It kind of was like reading this study of people describing what it felt like to have a crush on somebody was very helpful to me to be like, Oh, yes, I can do this. I can have these people like have a crush on each other. So that's an explicit example. I think, you know, I. Would go back to, like, the things that I watch constantly, which is The [00:27:00] Gilmore Girls and The Office.
I've watched Buffy a lot. You know that I watched Married at First Sight for a while, and that directly inspired The Husband Plot, where two strangers get married.
[00:27:11] Michael : Yes. Makes sense.
[00:27:15] Katherine Grant: Yeah. Yeah. Well, thank you so much for interviewing me. If you want more content like this, Michael is not going to be in the rest of the episodes, but I will be.
And we have some very exciting episodes lined up for our first month, including authors Erica Ridley, Charlie Lane, Gina Conkle. And more. So make sure that you subscribe to the podcast. And if you'd like to learn more about the Viscount Without Virtue, don't forget to go to the special link in the show notes to grab it for free.
So, thank you so much. Should we end it with a kiss? Sure.