Volume 2, Issue 2 – April 1999
Anne Stuart: Dark Romance
After 25 years as a published writer of romantic suspense, Anne Stuart (A.K.A. Sister Krissie the Impeccably Demure) admits to delusions of grandeur. She’s pretty sure she could fly if she put her mind to it. But chances are the mode of transportation would have nothing to do with a nun’s habit or angelic appendages.
Now Dracula’s cape or the leathern wings of some particularly handsome devil — either one would work quite nicely. The prop’s original owner would probably find himself cast in Stuart’s next novel too. Stuart specializes in turning heroes who are “mad, bad and dangerous to know” into “love slaves on the page.” And in keeping her readers clamoring for more.
Crescent Blues: Describe the ultimate Anne Stuart hero.
Anne Stuart: Evil evil evil.
OK, now that we’ve got that out of the way, please, describe the hero you wouldn’t kick out of bed for eating crackers.
My typical hero? Well, he’s always intelligent — almost too much so for his own good. Intelligent and clever — two different things. He’s cynical rather than idealistic, capable of being completely ruthless, quite often capable of killing. He’s usually elegant rather than earthy — though sexually speaking he can be very down-to-earth indeed. My very first book, published a glorious 25 years ago (Barrett’s Hill, Beagle Greatgothic — part of Ballantine — March 1974) had copy calling the hero “a dark but compelling man who was either trying to murder her — or seduce her. Or perhaps both…”
Obviously I haven’t changed much in 25 years.
What inspired you to write Barrett’s Hill?
I’d written all through my life — novels scrawled in black marble notebooks about the Beatles or Troy Donahue (I’m that old). When I wasn’t reading I was writing, and I adored gothics (dark, dangerous man, feisty heroine, strong setting). They weren’t publishing enough to keep me busy, so I decided to quit my job in New York (at the Rockefeller Foundation), move to the family vacation home in Vermont and write one. I was 22 at the time.
How much do you feel you were influenced by the era in which you started writing romance?
I was completely influenced by the era in which I started writing. Gothics and romantic suspense were what I read and adored. A plain love story was too one-dimensional for me back then — I wanted danger to spice it up. (A mystery or suspense novel was similarly too limited — I wanted love and a happy ending.) I like having a hero you can’t trust — after all, if you trust the hero where’s the conflict? Any woman with a brain would go off with a luscious, handsome, sexy man who also happened to be trustworthy.
How have you changed since then — as a writer and in terms of the types of characters and plots that draw you?
I’ve changed a bit since the beginning, branched out into more complex plots and characters. When you’re 25, you see things in fairly black and white terms — by the time you’re 50, you know better. I write stuff that’s more bittersweet quite often. I fully believe the hero and heroine will live together happily for the rest of their lives, but everything else doesn’t always work out as well, and some readers find that distressing.
Where does Alex MacDowell, the hero of your new suspense novel Shadow Lover, fit in the continuum of Anne Stuart heroes? Given the circumstances of his “second coming,” do you consider him more Lex Luthor or Superman?
Alex MacDowell is wicked, elegant, naughty, but without the ruthless streak many of my heroes have. He’s capable of sin but not treachery. But he’s a charming cheat and a liar, so he’d have to be good ol’ Lex Luthor rather than Superman. Bless Christopher Reeve, but ol’ Sup was just too bland.
How have changes in the market changed the stories you tell? Can readers anticipate more of your delightful “supernormal” romances, such as One More Valentine and Cinderman, anytime soon?
Market changes have an effect on what people write no matter how much they fight it. I’ve had a World War II story floating around in my head for a good twenty years now. Some day I’ll write it, but the time has never been right.
However, I’m fairly lucky in that editors give me a lot of freedom. I’ve been around long enough, written enough for the editors to know they can trust me to carry something off. What they might turn down in another writer they’ll let me do (though not always). My most recent Harlequin American, The Right Man. for instance, is a time travel, which is a major no-no right now in popular fiction and in series romances. But they let me do it, and I love how it worked out.
Lately, most of your books have been historicals, like Prince of Magic, or suspense, like Shadow Lover. What do you like best about writing historicals and suspense? What do you feel are your greatest challenges in these areas?
I mainly write in three genres: historical, romantic suspense and series romance. The intertwining thread is that they’re really all romantic suspense, with a dangerous man and a woman in jeopardy. It’s what I do.
But I love the variety. I’ve been told that it’s slowed my career by writing both historical and suspense, that I should concentrate on one until I’ve really made a place for myself, but I can’t. Historicals are fun, colorful, fast-moving, fantasy. They give me relief when I’ve been in the darkness too long. The suspense books are torn from my heart, which is as painful as it sounds. Gotta do it, but then I gotta have a break and write about cross-dressing Georgians and mad Druids or cat burglars.
What’s different about your approach to research when you’re writing a historical versus a topical suspense novel like Ritual Sins?
As for research, I tend to be pretty casual about it. I’m not a wonk — academia gives me the willies, probably because it was the family business. (My grandfather was head of the Classics Department at Princeton; my uncles were headmasters and professors.)
I tend to pick settings and eras I’m already familiar with. I’m more likely to go ahead and write and guess at details, and when I go back and check, I’m right about 90 percent of the time. My head is stuffed with trivia and arcane bits of knowledge, which comes in very handy for a writer. I do have extensive research books on the medieval era and England, and a few on more recent stuff (spies, police work, etc.) But I’m more interested in the big picture, not in details. The details have to be accurate, but they’re not that crucial to the way I write.
When you’re writing a darker novel like Ritual Sins, how do you keep “Sister Krissie the Impeccably Demure” in check? How did you get the nickname, by the way? And however did you manage to make it stick?
Sister Krissie the Impeccably Demure has a long and varied pedigree. I was born Anne Kristine Stuart and always went by my middle name, Krissie. When I was in my teens I made myself a nun’s habit out of my best friend’s curtains (shades of Scarlett O’Hara — literally!) and wore it to rock concerts. Hence the “sister” part — and because I believe that we’re all sisters, even the men.
The demure part came from a lovely man, who when he didn’t know me, referred to me as a demure young lady. Needless to say, there isn’t a demure bone in my body. So “The Demure One” doesn’t really have a snowball’s chance in hell with messing my muse while I’m writing things like RitualSins.
Your tattoos have become legendary too. Any chance you’d share with our readers the story behind them — and the placement of the second one you tease about at convention presentations?
[Laughing]: I hate to tell you, but there are times when the legend outpaces the truth. Just one tattoo, on my shoulder in the shape of a butterfly (though I may get another eventually — my sister has about seven).
I got it the weekend of Woodstock. I lived for music, but I didn’t want to go to Woodstock, because I’d heard there would be 50,000 people there (and there turned out to be anywhere from four to 10 times that amount!) So instead I got on the Long Island Railroad (the only time) and went out to Amityville, Long Island (home of the Amityville Horror) and got the tattoo. They sprayed my arm with alcohol in a Windex ™ bottle, then covered it up afterwards with a paper towel attached with masking tape. Lucky I don’t have Hepatitis (it was too early for AIDS).
I was 21, young and sassy. I had it touched up about five years ago when it was getting all faded. Lemme tell you, tattoos hurt a lot more at 45 than at 21.
I suppose with a history like that it was inevitable that some bureaucracy would insist on co-opting you, if only because every organization needs someone to stir them up. Congratulations on being named Romance Writers of America (RWA) Published Authors Network (PAN) Liaison. What are some of your goals as PAN Liaison?
I think they only voted for me because I could spell “liaison.”
Actually RWA has been a source of great joy for me over the years. Writing is a very solitary business and RWA has given me friends and community, so I thought it would be nice to give something back.
I’m most interested in fostering sisterhood, in helping the newly published authors into the fold without passing judgment on what form they’re published in, and strengthening the market, which helps everyone. My job is to look out for the published writers, which is of primary importance since the goal of every member of RWA is to be a published writer. Or at least I assume so.
The definition of “published author” under the PAN guidelines has been a subject of some controversy lately. Many royalty-paying electronic publishers and their authors feel RWA guidelines discriminate against those published on-line. What is RWA’s position on electronic publication?
At this point writers who’ve been published by small presses (including e-publishers) are put in an associate member category. They’re given full membership rights except the right to vote for PAN Liaison and the right to run for PAN Liaison, but that’s mine anyway. If an electronic publisher sells 5,000 copies of one romance title, then the writers published with that publisher get upgraded to full membership. RWA’s definition of a publisher is a royalty-paying press with national distribution (which e-pubs have) that’s sold over 5,000 copies of a single romance title.
However, there is an ad hoc committee looking into the possibility of eliminating the associate status and making everyone a general member, which I support.
One small caveat. I’m not an official RWA spokesperson. I don’t set policy, but I can say what I want as Princess of PAN.
As a writer who’s published very successfully for two decades, what do you feel are the keys to getting published and staying that way?
Actually I’ve been published for 25 years this month and the secret to staying alive is to love lots of things. If you only love time travels, then you’re flat out of luck. I loved gothics but also adored Georgette Heyer. I was writing regencies when gothics finally died a final death. I’m very adaptable — I can’t write what someone tells me to write, but I can find something on my own that fills my needs and fits a publisher’s.
Flexibility and adaptability are crucial. But so is staying true to your heart. You can’t chase around after fads — my first agent wanted me to write family dramas like Helen Van Slyke, which was absurd. Lavyrle Spencer is a wonderful writer but I could no more write a Lavyrle book than I could… well, I was gonna say fly, but then I pretty much believe I could fly if I wanted to. I have delusions of grandeur.
But I don’t want to write a Lavyrle Spencer book. I want to write my own, and I’m good at figuring out ways to do it and trick the editors. I write romantic suspense, but they never call it that. They prefer fiction or romance or suspense on the spine, because romantic suspense is tricky to market.
A number of your books, such as Prince of Magic and Prince of Swords, appear closely related in theme and form (i.e., two pairs of lovers, social barriers to the secondary romance, etc.). But in the last eight years at least, you have not published a typical romance series — one which develops a cycle of romances from among a core group of relatives, friends or acquaintances. Any special reason? Is it something you’d like to consider for the future?
I write the two-couple historicals because it gives me a satisfying balance. I can blend humor with darkness, and it pleases me and probably leavens what could be a rather heavy mixture for the reader. But I don’t do connected series books — they’re all stand-alone. Some people do connected books brilliantly — Jo Beverley and Ruth Wind come to mind. But quite often I don’t like to read them. Main characters from one book show up as supporting characters in others, and if I haven’t read the first book I feel like I’m at a party where everyone knows each other but me.
I do small things, though. The hero of Cry for the Moon showed up as the disk jockey at the end of One More Valentine. The hero of A Rose at Midnight, my first historical, was the ancestor of the hero of Bewitching Hour. I do little things to amuse myself, like appear as a one-year-old in The Right Man or name a character after my favorite musician (Richard Thompson).
Have you ever wanted to bring back one of your heroes or heroines for a sequel?
I did bring the hero of Catspaw back for a sequel (Catspaw II). He was too delightful to leave. And I loved The Demon Count so much I did a sequel to that one — I couldn’t bear to leave Venice so soon. I also did a series of three books — The Maggie Bennett series, for Dell — which has the same heroine, but because of that I had to kill her first hero, and no one’s ever forgiven me, including me.
Are there any other genres, in addition to romance and suspense, you’d like to explore?
I think I’d probably like to do futuristics at some point, but in fact, they’d probably be romantic suspense futuristics. I guess I just like sex and violence. (And rock-n-roll.)
Your introduction to the novella “Dangerous Lover” in the 1999 Valentine anthology My Secret Admirer, let the cat out of the bag. You do model some of your heroes and heroines on actors, television characters and other cultural icons. Could you share with our readers the names of some of your other inspirations and the characters they “played?”
Oh, I often model characters in my books on characters from movies and television. It gives me a start, and then they take on a life of their own.
The hero in My Secret Admirer is obviously Michael from La Femme Nikita; the heroine is Ally McBeal. I’ve used Alan Rickman in “The High Sheriff of Huntingdon” (Avon’s To Love and Honor) in his Sheriff of Nottingham persona, and used him as the hero in “Monster in the Closet” (Silhouette Shadows).
Daniel Day-Lewis is probably half my heroes, though they don’t end up with much resemblance to Hawkeye. Don Johnson in The Long Hot Summer showed up in Blue Sage and Heat Lightning; The Phantom of the Opera in Night of the Phantom; Frank Langella as Dracula (I saw him on Broadway) in The Demon Count.
Right now I’m doing Brad Pitt as a medieval court jester (Brad’s finally gotten old enough to be interesting), and Shadow Lover was Val Kilmer in The Saint. It’s one of the best perks of the job — you see a gorgeous actor in a perfect role and then you go home and make him your love slave on the page.
Where does a novel or short story start for you? Is the seed a character, a plot or a sharply visualized scene?
My writing starts from all sorts of odd places. Sometimes a movie, sometimes a thought, sometimes a song. It can start with character, with plot, or with setting. It just comes sailing in like scattered clouds, a bit at a time, and sooner or later it begins to form a whole.
How do you grow that seed into a novel? Do you write “straight through” or skip around? Do you find character charts and other organizational devices useful in the process?
I’ll take notes, write brief character descriptions (that usually end up nothing like the character in the book). I’ll have an idea who where the story should go, maybe envision a few scenes, but mostly I work without a net, just making things up as I go along, from beginning to end of the story. I’m a completely right-brained writer — charts and organization are anathema to me.
Do you work differently when writing a short story or novella?
The difference between writing a novella and a full novel is that the novellas are a helluva lot shorter. They’re fun, less stressful. I can just throw everything at it and move very quickly. I don’t worry about subtleties and foreshadowing, I just go for it. They’re lots of fun, and I think they’ve been some of my very best writing.
Do you identify more with your heroines or your heroes? Which of your characters do you most identify with?
Do I identify with my heroes or heroines? Hmmm. Sometimes my heroines aren’t as brave as readers would like them to be, and that’s me. When things get really bad — emotionally bad — I want to run and hide. Sometimes my heroines do the same.
In truth I’m more like some of my supporting characters, caustic and warm-hearted, generous and impractical. I think I like being the Creator more than the hero or heroine — it has more power.
Jean Marie Ward