262. A Conspiracy in Belgravia: An Interview with Sherry Thomas

[music]

Sarah Wendell: Hello, and welcome to episode number 262 of Smart Podcast, Trashy Books. I am Sarah Wendell from Smart Bitches, Trashy Books, and this interview is with Sherry Thomas. We talk about her upcoming book, A Conspiracy in Belgravia, which is the second book in her Charlotte Holmes series. We talk about where Ms. Holmes is going, how the cover art for this book has changed, and we talk about what happens in the story, but don’t worry, there are no spoilers. We also talk about the world that’s been created around Charlotte, and we discuss Sherry’s theory as to why Sherlock Holmes is a figure who is so enticing to rewrite, recast, and revisit. Her theory is really interesting. She also shares some of her secrets of worldbuilding and some of the details of her research, and of course we talk about what she’s reading. Plus, I have a link to a free short story from Sherry Thomas that’s part of the Charlotte Holmes world, so if you are as into this series as I am, I will have a link to that!

This week’s podcast is brought to you by Once a Rebel by Mary Jo Putney. Known for captivating characters and exceptional historical detail, romance legend Mary Jo Putney writes beautifully crafted, deeply emotional historical romances with a dash of adventure. In Once a Rebel, Mary Jo Putney tackles a setting rarely seen in historical romance: the War of 1812. As experienced by the hero and heroine who are on the ground in the thick of things, the British infantry burned Washington, DC, to the ground, and the British Navy attempts to capture Baltimore, the conflict that inspired America’s national anthem. The battle for Baltimore is rendered in exquisite detail, making Once a Rebel a poignant look at the fledgling American nation and its relationship with Britain as the characters’ loyalties to the crown are tested. All’s fair in love and war, and you can find out more at kensingtonbooks.com. And I want to send big, effusive thanks to Kensington for sponsoring the podcast this month. Thank you, Kensington! You are awesome.

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So, are you ready for an interview? I’m ready for an interview. I’m really excited to share this with you. I’ll have information at the end of the podcast about the music, as you probably knew, ‘cause you probably hang out here each week. Without any further delay, on with the interview, and on with the podcast!

[music]

Sarah: Welcome back to the podcast, ma’am.

Sherry Thomas: Thank you, Sarah! It’s great to be back! [Laughs]

Sarah: I’m su-, I’m super pleased to talk to you again. It’s really nice when I get to talk to people for each book, and I don’t know if – [laughs] – if you knew this, but your publicist sent out what might have been the best book mail I’ve ever received.

Sherry: Ooh! I’d love –

Sarah: I got –

Sherry: – to hear about that.

Sarah: I got – well, sometimes an advanced copy will arrive with a thing. You know, sometimes it’s, like, chocolate or a candle. I’ve gotten little packets of tea. So this arrived in a box, wrapped up with a really beautiful cup, teacup and saucer –

Sherry: Mm!

Sarah: – and a madeleine in a package, and then two, two sachets of tea and a little note that was like, we’re finally here! It’s finally here; you can read it! And this, this teacup is possibly the nicest piece of china I own now. It is so beautiful.

Sherry: Ooh! You know, I think I, I think I saw a picture of that on the, on their social media. I didn’t know what it was for; I thought they were just taking a nice picture. [Laughs]

Sarah: Nope, nope. It is, it is entirely your book mail. It was so impressive. And it was really –

Sherry: Oh, nice!

Sarah: – easily the nicest book mail that I have received in a very, very long time. It was super cool.

Sherry: Nice! Mine, mine just came in, in a, in an envelope. [Laughs]

Sarah: Oh.

Sherry: Nothing but an ARC.

Sarah: You, you got to write it. I guess that’s your prize.

Sherry: I, I guess, and they, they figure I probably already have madeleines on hand or something like that.

[Laughter]

Sarah: So, do you like this cover? I find this cover fascinating.

Sherry: I love it! I don’t know how much I, I’m supposed to reveal, but we actually had a different cover. I don’t know whether you ever saw the different cover. It was very, very pretty. It was, like, this purplish-blue background, a young woman in a, it might have been a yellow cape? I can’t quite remember, but, you know, it’s in front of a garden, it’s nighttime, it’s beautiful, but I always thought it was like, I always thought it was like a Gothic romance rather than a mystery, and lo and behold, it got changed suddenly one day. [Laughs] So, yeah, I, I really like this new cover, but of course, the new cover I’m slightly worried about too, because I keep thinking, if people look at this cover, they’re going to expect Jack the Ripper to hop out at any moment, and he does not; this novel has nothing to do with Jack the Ripper. But it’s so atmospheric; it’s so, like, old-timey London.

Sarah: Cover, I found the cover you’re talking about, and it is very blue and lush and green, and it looks like, it looks like a, a medieval had a baby with a fantasy novel?

Sherry: Right, right, that’s what –

Sarah: It’s the cape, the cape and the, and the trees. It’s –

Sherry: Yes, yes, exactly. Oh, so when Target was interested in this book and they were like, nah, not with this cover. [Laughs]

Sarah: What?! Well –

Sherry: Oh, you, you don’t know that. Big, big vendors, they will often request changes on covers if they don’t like the cover. I had gone through that with my YA fantasy book? We had a – I, I, I loved the first cover, but Barnes and Noble was like, nope, you know, so it got a new cover. I, I love the new cover just as much, but, you know, it was a very different tack. Mm-hmm.

Sarah: Wow. Well, one, one thing I love about the new cover is that it, it has very little color, and it’s very smoggy and smoky, the way that London is so often described?

Sherry: Yes, yes.

Sarah: And the, and the, the background is sort of faded into the clouds, and she is disappearing?

Sherry: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: And since the first one was her going through a door, going through the front door –

Sherry: Yes.

Sarah: – and now, because of circumstances in the first book, she would probably not be allowed in the front door of a number of houses –

Sherry: [Laughs]

Sarah: – now she’s disappearing, and that’s actually kind of where she wants to go.

Sherry: Yeah! I, I, I really like your read on it. Yeah.

Sarah: This is one of the books that I, that I got in the mail and I went, [gasps!] oohhh! I love this cover. I think it’s so evocative, and it’s different enough from the first one, but still has elements in common with it, too.

Sherry: Yes, very much, very much of, of the same, well, not necessarily the same style, but going toward the same direction, let’s say. Yes.

Sarah: Now, I know –

Sherry: When you put them together, they’ll definitely be a set.

Sarah: They’re definitely a set, yes. Now, I know, I know that for A Study in Scarlet Women was a play on A Study in Scarlet. What is, is there a play for the title of this book too?

Sherry: It, if it is a play, it is a very, very roundabout play. It’s actually a play on a BBC Sherlock title.

Sarah: Ooh!

Sherry: You remember BBC did up-, did an updated version of “A Scandal in Bohemia” called “A Scandal in Belgravia”? That’s their version of the Irene Adler story?

Sarah: Right.

Sherry: And so this is a take on that.

Sarah: Ohhh! That’s very cool.

Sherry: It’s very, it’s very roundabout, and it’s not about Irene Adler exactly, but basically what happened was toward the end of a, the first draft, so-called, the – you’ve heard of this term, the, the truck draft or the truck version? Basically, if the author’s hit by a truck, then the publisher can have something to sort of put out, but it’s, it’s not good, and it’s not completely ready, so at end of last year, I handed in a truck draft, but with the, with the final twenty percent maybe yet to be written, and I, and I was like, okay, so this is going to happen, this is going to happen, and then we’re going to have a big brawl in Belgravia. [Laughs]

Sarah: Ohhh!

Sherry: So I, so then I joke, we should call it A Brawl in Belgravia, and then I corrected myself: oh, maybe, like, A Conspiracy in Belgravia would do also, you know, if we don’t want to go, like, to the low road and say A Brawl in Belgravia, and they liked it, so that’s what it’s called.

Sarah: I, I do think Charlotte could hold her own in a brawl.

Sherry: Well, she wasn’t at the beginning of this book, but in, in the middle of this book, she started taking some, some lessons –

Sarah: Yes.

Sherry: – in fencing, so, so, and then –

Sarah: Yeah, I wouldn’t mess with her.

Sherry: [Laughs] And, and the girl’s got some heft, so, no, she’s not a tiny girl, so –

Sarah: No –

Sherry: – I think if she sits on you – [laughs]

Sarah: – she’s not.

Sherry: – if she sits on you, she’ll have some weight to her.

Sarah: So, I want to talk about what’s happening in this book and where, what, what happens in this text of the story, but also, I want to try to entice people to buy it and go back and read book one if they haven’t done that, so, you know, no big deal. And, and so as a result, I’m not really sure what to ask you that is too much of a spoiler, but I also imagine that you’ve been talking enough about the book at this point, you might have an explanation that works, and if not, I’ll just ask you all my spoilery questions.

Sherry: Okay. I actually haven’t talked about this book that much because the, the publicity push is only just starting, so –

Sarah: Ah, okay.

Sherry: – you might be the first person I’m talking about this book with at length. [Laughs] But let’s take off with it!

Sarah: Awesome! Let’s do it! Okay, so, at the end of the last book –

Sherry: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: – a number of things were both revealed and then sort of confirmed: Charlotte is now decidedly outside of good society.

Sherry: Right.

Sarah: And, which is interesting, because it means that she is, in a way, more free to do things. She has less boundaries and expectations of behavior put on her, but there are also places that she can’t go.

Sherry: That is correct!

Sarah: It puts her in a really strange place. So how is she going to use that strange status, and how is it that it doesn’t bother her?

Sherry: To put it mildly, I don’t think Charlotte has a whole lot of Fs to give in the first place.

[Laughter]

Sarah: She, she is very low on fucks to give. Like, she’s got, like, one for her entire life.

Sherry: Yeah, I think, I think she cares about her sister, and, from her old life, I think she cares very much for her, the two sisters who are still unmarried, and she cares about Lord Ingram, who is her friend, and they have this sort of unconsummated romantic longing for each other.

Sarah: Oh, yes, they do.

Sherry: They do. I think she cares about those few people, and seriously, everybody else can just go, you know, bite themselves as far as she’s concerned.

[Laughter]

Sherry: I mean, I, I am not saying that is good, but that has always been who she is. She’s –

Sarah: Right.

Sherry: – just not going to be very sentimentally attached to that many people, and that is very, that’s a very Sherlock Holmes-y thing, right? ‘Cause, ‘cause Sherlock likes Watson, he likes Irene Adler, and basically, he’s okay about Mycroft, and basically nobody else. So –

Sarah: Right.

Sherry: – so I think that, that is very much in the spirit of Sherlock Holmes. As for, as for what is she, she’s doing with her, with her new status, yeah, she, I think she’s just making money. She’s just keeping herself busy and – [laughs]

Sarah: Good for her!

Sherry: – and, and making money, and, because she wants to have her sisters with her eventually, and to do that she will need some money. It would, it’s not cheap. I mean, that’s the reason there were so many Victorian bachelors, weren’t there, because, because it’s expensive to keep a woman around. [Laughs]

Sarah: Right, and –

Sherry: And she plans to keep two women around. Even though she is not going to have children with them, it’s, you know, still, two women around costs money, and that’s what she’s working towards.

Sarah: So she is working, as always, with an eye on practical considerations. Her whole purpose is that, you know, things that she’s told she has to put a lot of value in, like her chastity and her behavior, she doesn’t actually put a lot of value in those things, but in terms of being able to actually support her family and herself, that’s what matters. So if the most expedient path is ruin yourself and start a business, then she’ll be like, she’s like, well, that’s fine. I’ll go do that.

Sherry: I think Charlotte, even though she doesn’t – I think sometimes she talks in those terms, but most of the time she doesn’t, but I believe she understands the world correctly in terms of power.

Sarah: Yes, exactly. Very much so.

Sherry: She, she observes, and she sees that, okay, if a woman knows how to deploy her reproductive system properly, she can gain power from that, but that has never been the route she preferred.

Sarah: Right.

Sherry: For, for – one of the reasons she didn’t like that is because you can only play that game once –

Sarah: Yes!

Sherry: – and still remain a good woman, you know, a so-called good woman, and that seems like way too big a bargain for her, but she likes the much more – they, when I was growing up, it was, it was not, it was late enough in China’s history, modern history, that we didn’t have to study Chairman Mao’s little, Little Red Book, but still, you know, it was, I was there long enough that you learn various things, and one of the things it is there in Chairman Mao’s thoughts is basically, political power comes from economic power.

Sarah: Not wrong about that!

Sherry: And, and I think, you know, Charlotte is definitely in agreement with that. You know, if you want to have control over yourself, it’s much better to have economic power, so that’s where her mind is bent toward.

Sarah: And whatever she has to do in order to obtain that economic power is what she’ll do.

Sherry: I don’t know if she’ll do whatever, but whatever that’s she’s willing to do, she will do. [Laughs]

Sarah: Right. So there’s a lot of interpersonal mystery in this book. So at the end of the last book, there’s a huge barrier now between her and Ingram, not the least of which is that he’s married and she’s, like, outside of society, but then his wife hires her!

Sherry: Yes.

Sarah: ‘Cause, you know, that’s not awkward.

Sherry: Not if you’re Sherlock, Char-, Charlotte Holmes! [Laughs]

Sarah: Oh, none, none for Charlotte, but, like, ooh!

Sherry: And every-, I think everybody else is like, nooo!

Sarah: And Charlotte is like, whatever, it’s fine.

Sherry: Money, money, money is money; clients are clients.

Sarah: The, the check will not bounce; all is well. And so, she has, she has to find Lady Ingram’s, well, I guess they were sweethearts? Or –

Sherry: Yes.

Sarah: – former?

Sherry: The term I often use is erstwhile sweetheart. [Laughs]

Sarah: Erstwhile sweetheart! Yes, that is a perfect way to describe this. And then Charlotte figures out that she’s connected to this person as well, so, like, it’s, it’s almost like there’re nine total people in London and the rest is done with mirrors, and she has to go find them all.

Sherry: Yes, yes. And this person happens to be her illegitimate brother, whom we briefly refer to in the previous book. So briefly that I’m not sure most people remembered it, but here it is again!

Sarah: So you had this part in mind when you were writing the first one.

Sherry: I had no idea what I had in mind when I was writing the first one.

[Laughter]

Sherry: But this is what I believe: if you wrote it, then you will use it later on.

Sarah: Yes, it’s there somewhere.

Sherry: So, so, so, basically, if I want to use something, I first go see whether I’ve mentioned something likely. You know, if I gave Charlotte a half-brother just for whatever purpose, unclear purposes, well, now it has a purpose! Yeah.

Sarah: So it’s Chekhov’s half-brother.

Sherry: Yeah.

Sarah: [Laughs] So, when, in this book, she’s going, she’s, it starts with a murder, and I have to say, my, my favorite part of the start of the book is Olivia trying to write about Sherlock Holmes.

Sherry: [Laughs]

Sarah: Okay, I’m a total sucker for book-in-a-book, like, already. Like, I’m al-, I’m already this, like, oh, this is great! Only thing better would be if there was, like, a reclusive person writing letters, and it was all epistolary; I also love epistolary things. But –

Sherry: I, I, I have every intention of writing a, an epistolary romance one of those days. I love epistolary anything, yeah. My books tend to have –

Sarah: I would love that.

Sherry: – an overabundance of letters in them.

Sarah: Yeah, that’s why I like ‘em. I love, I love letters. I love how – I was thinking about this just now when I was walking my dogs – I love how there are different forms of, of writing, and there’s a degree of intimacy and introduction that drops away, depending on what it is. So with a letter, you have a salutation, and you have, you know, how are you? Blah, blah, blah, and then you go to the mat-, the matter of it, and then you have a sign-off, so there’s, like, an on ramp and an off ramp. And with texting it’s just sort of like, noun, verb, k?

[Laughter]

Sarah: And so when you read, like, people’s email messages and letters and texts, there’re all these varying levels of intimacy. But that is a total tangent, and I’m going to shut up now.

Sherry: [Laughs]

Sarah: I love that Olivia is trying to write Sherlock’s story and –

Sherry: Finding it difficult.

[Laughter]

Sarah: Yes!

Sherry: That, that is like –

Sarah: She’s finding it difficult.

Sherry: That is like me starting that book over again and going, where the hell am I supposed to go with this?

[Laughter]

Sarah: I was, that was actually one of my, one of my questions. You know, when she struggles with the opening, is that what it’s like to start writing? Like, you struggle with the first scene?

Sherry: I shouldn’t say I struggle with the first scene. I struggle with the overall direction of the book, of which first scene is only the first mani-, manifestation of the problem.

[Laughter]

Sherry: I mean, I have written and discarded many a first scene simply because, you know, later on I realize, yeah, no, this actually, like, needs to start in a different place and needs to go to a different place, so, you know, yeah. Obviously, she’s not going to use any of her – [laughs]

Sarah: No, she’s not going to use any of those multiple openings –

Sherry: Yeah.

Sarah: – but I love that she’s finding it difficult. Like, this is really, this is hard! Like, surprise, yes, it is!

Sherry: Yes, yes. It’s, it’s kind of like taken from my own story, because, in a bit, because, because in, in this book she kind of, like, harshes Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Murders in the Rue Morgue,” which –

Sarah: Right.

Sherry: – which is, like, really obvious, like, really bit on-the-nose, Murder in the Rue Morgue.

[Laughter]

Sherry: To spoil it for people who have never read it, even though it’s been around for, I don’t know, 160 years? The culprit is an escaped orangutan.

Sarah: As you do.

Sherry: As, as, as you do, and, and, and Olivia is, like, completely pissed that, you know, it’s an orangutan –

[Laughter]

Sherry: – after all that fantastic setup. So she, like, she, like, hates on it in book one, and she hates on it in book two, and, but basically, she’s finding at this point, my God, it’s a lot harder to do better than the orangutan.

[Laughter]

Sherry: Yeah. Well, it’s kind of like my own story. I kind of threw a romance at a wall and go, I can do better than that! And then I, no, no, you actually can’t! You know.

Sarah: No, it’s really hard.

Sherry: Not for, not for years and years. Yeah.

Sarah: In this book, A Conspiracy in Belgravia, it’s safe to say it’s not an orangutan.

Sherry: It’s not an orangutan at all. Yeah, no, no. In fact, the person would be highly offended –

[Laughter]

Sherry: – to be compared to an orangutan, if they even know what an orangutan is. Yeah.

Sarah: So what can you tell readers about what happens to Charlotte in this book?

Sherry: What happens to Charlotte is, she accepts what she thinks will be a fairly straightforward case, because she thought the only difficult thing in this case is that the client is the estranged wife of a man whom she very much wished had not married this woman. [Laughs]

Sarah: Right.

Sherry: So, she’s not exactly unbiased in this, but she, usually she’s actually a lot less biased against this woman than a lot of other people, a lot of, you know, her friends, such as Mrs. Watson and Penelope Redmayne, Mrs. Watson’s niece; she’s a lot less biased than them. So when the case starts, Mrs. – not Mrs. – Lady Ingram comes and says, I have this, this young man whom I used to know, whom I used to love. I had to give him up to make, to form an advantageous marriage, because that was what was expected of me, and ever since I gave him up, we have never spoken to each other, we have never written each other. We only see each other once a year, and we don’t even talk to each other. We just, we just walk past the same place at the same time. So it’s been, this is the seventh year, and this is the year he does not show up.

Sarah: Oh, boy.

Sherry: And, and she is completely distraught; she doesn’t know what happened to him. Half of her is thinking, yeah, of course. It’s been seven years; he’s moved on. The other half is like, it’s, it’s not like him to, like, just give it up altogether without even a word, and that’s why she comes to Sherlock Holmes, because she, she can’t just take this problem to anybody. She’s a married woman looking for her “erstwhile sweetheart” –

Sarah: Right.

Sherry: – and so of course she has to go to a stranger, and so Charlotte, once she learns that the person Lady Ingram’s looking for is actually her half-brother, thought this was a piece of cake because she actually knows her half-brother’s address, because her half-brother has written to her father. This is her father’s illegitimate son. So he has written to her father and basically told him that he’s in London, he’s doing all this, so he had been an option when she was, when she left home in book one, he had been an option for her to go to. In the end, she did not go, go to him because she didn’t know him. She didn’t know whether he would help her in the first place or report her whereabouts to her father, and she didn’t know whether, also she didn’t know whether she would be just jumping from one man’s keeping to another’s. If she could be free, why not? So now she just thinks, well, I’ll, I’ll just go and see what’s going on. And then she goes and visits, and, and his, his landlady’s like, oh, yes, Mr. Finch. Mr. Finch has just gone on holiday. And she’s like, huh. So you have here his, his old fiancée who’s, his old girlfriend who’s basically, like, tearing her hair out for the, for the want of him, and he seems to be, like, doing just fine, and the landlady’s saying, oh, he’s good, you know. And so it goes on with, with the case getting stranger and more complicated ever-, at every turn, as, as mysteries are supposed to do. [Laughs]

Sarah: Right, ‘cause it is never as easy as you think it’s going to be when you start.

Sherry: Right. And –

Sarah: “This is going to be easy” are, like, famous last words.

Sherry: [Laughs]

Sarah: So in the beginning of Olivia’s attempts to, to, to write Charlotte’s story, she says it’s a tale of woe and vengeance. Is this a tale of woe and vengeance?

Sherry: No, she, she’s, she’s summa- –

Sarah: And orangutans?

Sherry: She’s summarizing the previous story, because she, she is writing a version of the previous story, since book one of the series is based on A Study in Scarlet. So that, that, that was a vengeance story, so she was trying to summarize that as a story of woe and vengeance.

Sarah: Right. So this one, not so much woe; more like, what the hell.

Sherry: Yes. This, this one, I think, in the end, is very much a conspiracy, right?

Sarah: Right. For readers who are starting this series, it’s probably best to start with book one.

Sherry: I think so. Although I’ve read from some people that they have just read second book directly, and it works as a standalone. I think. I, I, I cannot judge because I know the story. But I’ve read some reviews that said they were not, they didn’t have too much difficulty following because, you know, we are following – after all, this is a Sherlock Holmes pastiche, and –

Sarah: Right, of course.

Sherry: Yes.

Sarah: I’ve noticed there are a lot of female recasting of classical male stories going around. What is it that you think about, about Sherlock Holmes that is so intriguing that he gets revisited so often? I mean, what was it, intriguing about it, about him for you?

Sherry: I think it’s two things. One, which makes it possible, is that we don’t know anything biographical about Sherlock Holmes at all, because to work on my pastiche, I actually went and did a, did a little research, and basically, Conan Doyle never gave you any biographical information, other than the fact that –

Sarah: No.

Sherry: – he has a brother named Mycroft and maybe another one named, you know, Sherrinford or, or whatever. We do not know his age, other than he was an adult, nominally, at the beginning of, of A Study in Scarlet, and we don’t know what kind of family he came from, although people have deduced that he must be from either upper gentry or minor aristocracy, given that he seemed to live a very free, Bohemian type of style, and he doesn’t seem to need the money from his cases, since he turns down anything he doesn’t like. And, and so all there is to, to Sherlock Holmes is basically a brain and a set of demeanors.

Sarah: Right.

Sherry: Then you can, you can, and then subsequent writers could come and project anything else they want upon him. He could be young, he could be old, he could be, you know, he could have had a, a previous marriage for all that anybody knows, ‘cause I think some people have gone that way. Some people have – I think in the Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes book by Laurie King, she, she gave Sherlock Holmes a son with Irene Adler, which happened before, before Mary, Mary Russell came on the scene. So that’s one thing, in that you are completely, the, the later writers are almost completely unlimited in what they can do with Sherlock Holmes in terms of biographical details. And another thing is that he is so blunt.

[Laughter]

Sarah: He really is!

Sherry: Yeah, he’s so blunt, so free to call anybody an idiot and, and all that. I mean, nowadays I think people in our society are pretty free to call each other idiots too, but, but think about in Victorian times, when there’re so many layers of etiquette and politeness. That is just freeing! It is just freeing; it is like, you know, it’s nice to see him call the incompetence and whatever outright when, when the reader, average reader probably was, you know, would love to have said that to somebody’s face but would never dare. So I think that’s another part of the fascination about him is, is just the, the pure honesty and kind of like, of course, the author being, this being wish fulfillment, gave him enough power and prestige and, and intellect to get away with everything because he’s always right.

Sarah: Right.

Sherry: You can’t take down somebody who’s always right. You have to wait till they’re wrong to, like, kick them and – [laughs] – while they’re down. Yeah.

Sarah: And being always right and having no fucks to give is a dangerous combination.

Sherry: It’s a dangerous combination, which is why, I think, they gave him, the later writers tend to give him various vulnerabilities, right, the, the drug addiction and all that. [Laughs]

Sarah: To write that set of very unspecific characteris-, characteristics onto a woman opens a whole other realm of possibilities, doesn’t it?

Sherry: It’s, not only opens it up, but it’s kind of basically, it’s, how to say it, it changes the equation altogether.

Sarah: Yes, very much so.

Sherry: ‘Cause, because, because women are not supposed to be like that at all.

Sarah: No.

Sherry: Not even today; she’ll be kind of, you know, problematic. Back then, it was an absolute no-no, so by changing her, by changing the character of Sherlock Holmes into a woman, it’s, it’s, it’s not just changing the gender; it changes the, everything that goes with the story: how the story can be set up, what kind of life she can lead, and, you know, what kind of difficulties she’ll face that, that a male Sherlock Holmes never had to deal about.

Sarah: Hence social boundaries being such an issue for Charlotte.

Sherry: Yes, exactly. And, well, actually, it was never her problem. [Laughs]

Sarah: No, it wasn’t really her problem.

Sherry: It was, it was, it was everybody else’s problem. Yeah, she was –

Sarah: I mean, she dealt with that in the first chapter.

Sherry: Yeah, she –

Sarah: She’s like, we’re just going to solve this problem right –

Sherry: Right, right now, yes, yeah.

Sarah: [Laughs] You know what, I, I, I kind of want her to have sex that she enjoys at some point?

Sherry: I’m sure she will. I’m sure she will, but –

Sarah: You know?

Sherry: But, you know, we –

Sarah: It was so bad!

Sherry: – we, we, we –

Sarah: It was so bad!

Sherry: – we are, we are still in the pre-contraception era, so – [laughs]

Sarah: Right, yes, she can’t enjoy it too frequently.

Sherry: Charlotte, Charlotte, Charlotte has to think carefully about it before she, you know.

Sarah: Yes. Very much so. [Laughs] What are you working on right now? Are you – I know you’re about to do the promotional tour and campaign for A Conspiracy in Belgravia. What are you working on? Are you working on book three in this series already?

Sherry: I, I am nominally working on book three. I have done some work on book three over the summer, and as usual, that work got thrown out.

[Laughter]

Sarah: It’s all part of the process.

Sherry: It’s all part of the process, no problem, but it’s just that, you know, sometimes, sometimes deadlines start bearing down, and, and I always used to say, it’s like my balls have been nailed to the wall; it’s just that the signal haven’t rea-, hasn’t reached my brain yet.

[Laughter]

Sherry: Yeah, so, in, in about a month or so I’ll be, like, in a state of minor panic, but right now I’m still like, la-la-la! You know.

Sarah: [Laughs] So, do you know what you’re going to do with the next book in the series, or are you still sort of exploring all of the options?

Sherry: I think by throwing out what I don’t want to do, I am now sort of set on what I will do. It, it’s always like this. For some reason I always think that, you know, this will be a nice thing to do. Let me do it in a future book. No, idiot. If you think something’s nice to do, that, because, that’s because you cannot think of anything else that’s nice to do, so you have to use it for this book, not for future book.

Sarah: Right, don’t save it! Use it! That’s why your –

Sherry: Yeah.

Sarah: – that’s why your brain had that idea.

Sherry: Exactly. The, the plot in book two was definitely something that I had been saving for, like, book five or six down the road, and I wrote it, and I wrote it, and it was like, yeah, you know what, I don’t have any other ideas. We’d better use the plot from book five.

[Laughter]

Sarah: So you’re going to get to that book five and be like, damn it, Past Sherry!

Sherry: Past Sherry, you stole what you were supposed to do for book five! Now what the heck are we going to do for book five? [Laughs]

Sarah: So you have sort of a, an overarching idea of where this series will go.

Sherry: Ah. You’re asking the wrong person. [Laughs] If I, if I did – no, actually, actually, I did, back when I thought those ideas were in book five!

Sarah: [Laughs]

Sherry: But I’ve, but I’ve already stolen in book two the idea, old idea for the book five, and now, after having thrown out the first draft of book three, I am stealing the next best idea for book five. So –

[Laughter]

Sarah: Oh, well, piece of cake!

Sherry: So next summer I’ll be sitting here again going, crap!

[Laughter]

Sherry: I wonder if book eight has something I can steal from.

Sarah: Oh, darn.

Sherry: Yeah. So, yeah, so, yes, originally I had an idea for book five, but that’s going to be book three now, so book five will just have to fend for itself when the time comes. Yeah. Book five can go fuck itself now. I only have to worry about book three now.

[Laughter]

Sherry: Yeah.

Sarah: So, plot notwithstanding, you sort of have a vision of where all of these people are going to end up. Sort of, maybe, perhaps.

Sherry: Maybe. I don’t want to, like you said, I do want Charlotte to be having regular good sex at some point, so –

Sarah: Right?

Sherry: – I think, yeah. So that, so that’s –

Sarah: She’s a smart lady! She deserves a good orgasm!

Sherry: That’s, that’s something to be working toward, right? You know, when –

Sarah: Yes.

Sherry: – when all, when all else fails, you know, strive toward the orgasms.

Sarah: Right? I think that’s a very good, I think that’s a very good goal.

Sherry: Yeah, it worked for romance. Yeah, sure. [Laughs] No –

Sarah: When all else fails, go for a good orgasm.

Sherry: Yeah.

Sarah: It solves a lot of things.

Sherry: At least points, points, point the lady in the direction of the orgasms. Yes.

Sarah: [Laughs] Yes, at least give her something to hope for.

Sherry: If she, if she, if she can’t find it with a map and a good light, then that’s her problem.

Sarah: Right. Certainly, it’s certainly not his problem. It’s got to be, got to start with her.

[Laughter]

Sarah: So, with the world that you’ve created around, around Charlotte, there are a lot of characters around her, and one of the things that I really loved about the first book was the female friendships, that she develops real friendships and, like you said a moment ago, when Lady Ingram comes, you know, the other women are like, well, she’s horrible, and Charlotte doesn’t treat her the way that other characters do. How have you been building the female relationships in this series through the next book?

Sherry: You mean the next book that is now –

Sarah: I mean the one, A Conspiracy in Belgravia –

Sherry: Oh, okay.

Sarah: – the one that’s coming out.

Sherry: I was like, you mean the one I was just trying to outline this morning that’s, like, four lines-

Sarah: Oh, no, I’m talking about, talking about –

Sherry: Yeah, this is the second book, yeah.

Sarah: – book six! Book six, yeah. How are the girls in book six doing?

Sherry: Every-, orgasms for everybody! Orgasms for you!

Sarah: Yes!

Sherry: Orgasms for you! Orgasms for you! How’s that?

Sarah: That is just what I wanted!

Sherry: I, I, I’ve booked Oprah.

Sarah: [Laughs] You’re orgasmic Oprah?

Sherry: Oh, I’m orgasmic Oprah, yes.

Sarah: Everybody gets an orgasm in book six!

Sherry: So, her relationship with Mrs. Watson is, like, one part partners, one part friends, and one part kind of like mother/daughter relationship.

Sarah: Yes!

Sherry: So in this, you know, there’s no relationship without conflict, and, and so, so in this, Mrs. Watson is slightly frustrated with this young woman. I mean, first of all, she’s, like, taking on Lady Ingram as a client, and Mrs. Watson hates Lady Ingram with the force of a thousand suns. And then she’s just going around, you know, solving other stuff and just coming home late and all that, and, and basically, Mrs. Watson, as any other good maternal lady, is worried, and when she’s worried, she’s like, you, you, you! And, but then Charlotte is kind of like, yeah, you know what, you’re right. Because, you know, although Charlotte has no fucks to give, she also doesn’t hold on too hard to her own vanity and, and all that other stuff that prevents people from apologizing for mistakes and stuff. And, and so, and so one of Mrs. Watson’s concerns is that her, her father still hasn’t come for Charlotte, because, because this, we’re still living in an era where, they’re still in the era where a young, young lady, fallen or not, who’s just out living her own life, that is, like, considered unacceptable to the family. So Lady, Mrs. Watson is really concerned that, you know, Charlotte could just be snatched off the street, you know, by her father or the man her father hires just, and just dragged back home and stuffed into a cottage and never to see the light of the day again. So, so, so then her concern is that Charlotte be able to defend herself, and so when I said earlier in the podcast that Charlotte’s been learning some fencing skills, it’s actually from Mrs. –

Sarah: Right.

Sherry: – Mrs. Watson!

Sarah: Cool! Cool!

Sherry: Yes. So, so they are the ones, and Charlotte, here I gave Charlotte a little bit of my difficulties with exercises.

[Laughter]

Sherry: Which is basically like a little bit of it and, you know, she’s ready to be flat on the floor. Yeah.

Sarah: [Laughs] So she, so she struggles with it.

Sherry: Oh, yeah, she struggles, yes. Mm-hmm. And actually, I was in Smith College this past spring, and they had a, they had their own little version of Comic Con, which was a lot of fun and very well organized, and they had brought in some local historical martial arts practitioners. I just happened to casually ask somebody, say, hey, I happen to have this scene, so then I actually got expert consultation on –

Sarah: Oh, cool!

Sherry: – exactly what kind of martial arts they were using and what would be good for, like, you know, for stuff like, for just like a cane you have around and this and that, so, yeah, so they are actually practicing a French form of martial art called canne de combat and whacking at each other pretty good. Yeah.

Sarah: That’s very cool!

Sherry: I know!

Sarah: Are you, are you now an expert in this form of combat?

Sherry: Eh, no, I only know enough to fill two pages.

[Laughter]

Sherry: And that’s with a lot, that’s with, that’s with the, the very nice gentleman going line by line down it with me. [Laughs] But, but –

Sarah: [Laughs] That’s very cool, though!

Sherry: But that’s the thing, but that’s the thing: I only need to know a tiny bit more than everybody else for them to think I know a lot more. [Laughs]

Sarah: This is true. It’s like the, the anti-method acting style of writing. You need to know just a little bit more than the reader.

Sherry: Yes, yes. That’s always been my method of writing. [Laughs]

Sarah: Were there, were there other parts of researching this book that you found really fun?

Sherry: Were there other parts of researching this book?

Sarah: Or, like, you know, does research suck all the way around?

Sherry: Oh, yeah, yeah! There were, well, because, because there’s a subplot involving Olivia in her, in her, in her effort to write a proper Sherlock Holmes story, right?

Sarah: A tale of woe and vengeance!

Sherry: Yes, yes. So, after she decided the tale of woe and vengeance was inadequate, she, she, basically she sets out to read all kind of similar kind of stories, so I kind of gave myself a very, well, like I say, like a thimbleful of an education – [laughs] – on, on the earliest mystery, works of mystery, because those are the, those –

Sarah: Oh!

Sherry: – those are the ones she’d be reading, I mean, other than –

Sarah: Right, of course.

Sherry: – yeah, there, there were your Edgar Allan Poe and, and there’s some, a couple of works by this gentleman named Mr. Wilkie Collins? I’m trying to think what it is. It’s actually a, a German book, but set in France, also a mystery, slight adventure, kind of very early, that today we wouldn’t recognize it as mystery, but, you know, back then they were all the rage. So, so that she could read them and so that she and this young man she meets could talk about them, ‘cause he happened to be a connoisseur of early detective novels too, so that was, that was a lot of fun to put together. Yeah.

Sarah: That is cool! That’s more book inside a book inside a book.

Sherry: Yes, yes. Because, because –

Sarah: Right.

Sherry: – why not? People who, who read books already like books, so – [laughs] – they’re just more, more stuff for them to like.

Sarah: And also representing what characters were reading at that time and including what, like, actual people were reading and obsessed with at that time makes the setting more vivid.

Sherry: Yes, yes, and those were the popular, popular fiction of that era. Yeah. Those all were –

Sarah: Right, of course!

Sherry: – very well received books, very well received at least, you know, like, people liked them and the author made money. [Laughs]

Sarah: And adding the popular culture of a time period, it, it exposes more about those people.

Sherry: Yes, yes. I’ve, I’ve always liked, when I, when I do worldbuilding, I always like to put in details, and always, if possible, I like to put in surprising details. Surprising, not in the sense of surprising, but surprising in the sense that it – kind of like when you read The Lord of the Rings, sure, Tolkien put a lot of details in there, but you have the sense that this is part of a much bigger history and culture and literature that he’s just putting, like, tiny bit out of.

Sarah: Right.

Sherry: That’s always been the kind of sense that I want to give so that you have a feeling that it’s a much wider world, not, not just, like, concentrated on these characters, that they are actually living in a world, not against a back-, white back-, backboard.

Sarah: Right. That the world exists around them, and you’re reading a narrow piece of it.

Sherry: Yeah. So I always like such things that, if, especially if I can have people say, oh, yeah, this was fashionable two years ago. [Laughs] Then it gives a sense like there’s time for those people also that’s like now it’s modern and, you know, that’s, like, out of fashion and all that. Yeah.

Sarah: When A Study in Scarlet Women was released, did you hear from people who aren’t romance readers? Did this attract a different readership to your work?

Sherry: I think it did. Interestingly enough, sometimes I hear from romance readers who say they give it to their parents or people they know who, who might be reluctant to read romance because of whatever preconceived ideas about romance. I can’t at the – oh, gosh. I hope you forgive me, but there’s this, there’s this, there’s this lady on Twitter who told me that she gave A Study in Scarlet Women to her mother, and, because her mother won’t read romance, so she has to first prove that I am a decent writer.

Sarah: Oh, my gosh.

Sherry: So her mother, mother is a bit of a book snob. So –

Sarah: Oh, gosh!

Sherry: – so, so, so then, so then, after she read A Study in Scarlet Women, she was willing to read my romances, and then she was reading them and going, oh, my God! There’s too much sex! Bring on the next book!

[Laughter]

Sherry: There’s still too much sex! How ‘bout the next book? [Laughs] I, I hope I’m telling this story right, because that’s sort of the impression I was under.

[Laughter]

Sherry: Yeah. Still, it’s not everybody’s cup of tea, you know, on, on-page sex, but it’s all right.

Sarah: So the question I always ask each guest is what are you reading that you want to tell people about?

Sherry: Right now, well, I can tell you, but I don’t think most people are going to be able to read it. [Laughs] Right now I’m actually making my way through a set of Chinese martial arts novels that I had first read when I was a child, and I’m not sure why; I saw them at the library and I grabbed them, and five, there’s five volumes, and I’m making my way through them. I gave up using the dictionary, like, a hundred pages in. I just, like, yeah, I still understand it. I don’t know how to pronounce everything. [Laughs] But –

Sarah: Wow.

Sherry: – but other than that, other than that, I’m also reading a book called Ancillary Justice, which is – yeah, I’ve been, this year I’ve been reading a lot of plot-heavy stuff and a lot of science fiction, so basically I was like, what is some of the best science fiction that’s been written this century? I want to – and this came up for this! And when I saw it, when I saw it, I realized I had heard it recommended elsewhere before. It’s, it’s a very interesting book in that everybody’s female.

Sarah: Oh, interesting!

Sherry: Not, not, not, which is not the case, but, but the protagonist is speaking in a language that has, has no gender distinction, so –

Sarah: Oh, wow!

Sherry: – everybody’s, by default, a she!

Sarah: Right.

Sherry: Sometimes the, the narrator will say, I can, I can tell that this person is a male, but then go on referring to them as she again. [Laughs]

Sarah: Wow! That is really interesting!

Sherry: Yes, yes, and, and of course that by itself would just be a gimmick without the story to back it up, but so far the story has been fascinating, and, and it’s, it’s both, both seems kind of like related to the present and seems completely alien, so that’s, that’s totally what you want out of any science fiction, right? So I’ve been –

Sarah: Yes, totally!

Sherry: – having a lot of fun with that. And that’s written by Ann Leckie, if I’m not mistaken. It’s the first book in a trilogy. And also I just listened to Midnight Riot.

Sarah: Oh, I just finished reading that series! What did you think?

Sherry: I liked it! But, my God –

Sarah: Yeah, me too.

Sherry: – it’s, it’s a lot denser and a lot more violent than I expected from the beginning.

[Laughter]

Sarah: Yeah, it’s pretty violent.

Sherry: Like, like, I often will put on audio books when I cook –

Sarah: Right.

Sherry: – and at some point I was like, I don’t know if this is a good audiobook to be cooking with! There’s –

[Laughter]

Sherry: Like, definitely I would not be able to eat while reading it, so should I cook while listening?

Sarah: [Laughs]

Sherry: It was a really good book, but, yeah, as I said, dense and unexpectedly violent, given, at the beginning it seemed kind of like Harry Potter-ish! So it’s like Harry Potter meets, like, Hannibal Lecter or something. Or Dexter.

Sarah: Yeah!

Sherry: Yeah, kind of –

Sarah: Yes, it’s, it gets kind of gory, the farther you get into it.

Sherry: Yes, yes! Like, so, ergo, it starts feeling denser and denser, but I am undeterred. I am in the middle of listening to the second book now, so – [laughs]

Sarah: How do you like the, the audio? ‘Cause I read them. How do you like the, the audio narration?

Sherry: I really like the audio. I, I enjoy a good performance because they, they give everybody a different accent, right?

Sarah: Yes, yes!

Sherry: Yeah, so, so, especially in this book, has a very diverse cast, and it has, has, like, for example, the Mama, Mama Thames speaks with a Nigerian accent or, I mean, Nigerian accent, and I think Beverly Brook speaks with a, I’m not sure. I don’t think it’s African, but it’s like, it’s, it’s, it’s a different kind of London accent than, say, the narrator speaks or, say, her more posh sister, Tyburn speaks and, and all that, so, so it’s, it’s very interesting. I, I like it when, you know, a, a narrator can bring, like, thirty different accents to bear.

Sarah: Yes. And remember them all! It’s really impressive.

Sherry: Yes, yes. Which makes our job as listener easier.

Sarah: Definitely. Do you ever read and then listen or listen and then read a particular book?

Sherry: I’m trying to think whether – yes, yes. I believe I have listened to Bridget Jones’s Diary and then, either I was reading it and started listening to it or listening to it and got too impatient and started reading it?

Sarah: [Laughs]

Sherry: But I feel like a book such as Bridget Jones’s Diary is especially good on audio because, for, for those people who have read Bridget Jones’s Diary, you know that every, start of every entry is calories consumed, drinks consumed, fags consumed, stuff like that, right?

Sarah: Yep.

Sherry: And, and, and –

Sarah: Yep.

Sherry: – the weight, weight, weight du jour. [Laughs]

Sarah: Yes.

Sherry: I feel like when you read, you tend to become too impatient, you skip over all those things, when actually a lot of times the humor is in, you know, how many cigarettes she consumed, how many drinks she consumed, you know, because she’s so stressed and this and that. Yeah. Although, although the, the bad thing about audio is it’s slow. Sometimes you go –

Sarah: Yes, I have to speed it up.

Sherry: Yeah, sometimes you go like, I have two hours; I could actually finish this book instead of, like –

Sarah: [Laughs]

Sherry: – wait, wait, waiting to cook another whole week before I get to the end of this.

[Laughter]

Sarah: Yes, I know that problem.

Sherry: Yeah.

Sarah: I’ve had to start speeding up my audiobooks because I get impatient, and I find that if I speed it up to about 1.3 or 1.4 times normal speed, they don’t sound like Alvin and the Chipmunks, but it’s fast enough that my brain is kept active, keeping up with the, keeping up with the performance.

Sherry: Right, but, but I still, I kind of like, I tried it, but I still find it goes a little too fast, and I think I like, like, I like the natural cadence of –

Sarah: Especially if they’re doing different accents, ‘cause then you can savor them.

Sherry: Right, right, and also, when you are, like, standing in front of the fridge trying to remember what is it you’re trying to pull out of there, like, I mean –

Sarah: [Laughs]

Sherry: – am I looking for, for onion or milk? If they’re talking at one-and-a-half speed, I don’t think I can pay attention to both at the same time.

[Laughter]

Sarah: This is very true!

[music]

Sarah: And that is all for this week’s episode. I want to thank Sherry Thomas for hanging out with me, and I want to thank you for hanging out with me as well! In the podcast entry at smartpodcasttrashybooks.com – no, that’s not right. Can’t even get my own URL right; are you listening to this? I don’t know if you can tell, but I’m sure that you can tell; I have a bit of a cold, and I’ve had it for over a week, so I’ve just kind of given up on not having a cold, but apparently cold medicine makes you get your own URL wrong, so let me, let me try that again. I’ll just leave all this in and hope it’s entertaining. At smartbitchestrashybooks.com/podcast, I have the podcast entry, also known as the show notes, and inside the show notes, I have a link to a free short story from Sherry Thomas that’s part of the Charlotte Holmes world and the first cover for the second book. The first version of this cover for the second book is now the cover of the short story, and it’s really beautiful, as is the cover for the second book and the first one. I will have links to both of those, and I will have links to all of the books we talked about, as well as pictures of the covers, should you wish to check them out. I mean, I like cover art; I assume you do too. You can find all of that at smartbitchestrashybooks.com/podcast. Hey, look at that! I remembered my own URL. And we also have an iTunes page at iTunes.com/DBSA.

This week’s podcast is brought to you by Once a Rebel by Mary Jo Putney and by Kensington Publishing. Thank you, Kensington! Known for captivating characters and exceptional historical detail, romance legend Mary Jo Putney writes beautifully crafted, deeply emotional historical romances with a dash of adventure. In Once a Rebel, Mary Jo Putney tackles a setting rarely seen in historical romance: the War of 1812. As experienced by the hero and heroine on the ground in the thick of things, the British infantry burn Washington, DC, to the ground, and the British navy attempt to capture Baltimore in a conflict that inspired America’s national anthem. The battle for Baltimore is rendered in exquisite detail, making Once a Rebel a poignant look at the fledgling American nation and its relationship with Britain as the characters’ loyalties to the crown are tested. All’s fair in love and war. You can find Once a Rebel at kensingtonbooks.com. And again, thank you, Kensington, for sponsoring the podcast this month!

I’d also like to thank Dayquil, Mucinex, and all of the cold medicine that I’ve been taking this week trying to have enough of a voice and, you know, breath to record this.

I would also like to tell you about two things: first, we have a podcast Patreon, and if you’ve had a look at patreon.com/SmartBitches or if you’ve become a patron, thank you! That is most awesome of you. I invite you to have a look if you haven’t because if you like the podcast, helping me grow it or can make it grow – I don’t know, can grow really be used as a verb like that? Yeah, making the podcast grow-able. Hey, that’s good! The Patreon helps the podcast grow, and I appreciate your support. I appreciate every recommendation and review and all of your subscriptions to the podcast which contribute to its impressions and the way that it shows up in all of the different podcasting apps. And there are so many!

The music that you are listening to is from Sassy Outwater. You can find her on Twitter @SassyOutwater. This track is Caravan Palace; it’s called “Maniac.” I am not a maniac, I’m actually pretty sleepy, but you can find this particular song, if you would like to dance to it, which you totally should, on their two-album set Caravan Palace and Panic. You can find it at Amazon and iTunes, and you can find Caravan Palace on Facebook and on their website, caravanpalace.com.

I’m going to have to find more music where the people are on MySpace because it gives me a terrible, terrible joy to say, and you can find them on MySpace! And none of them are on Friendster. That’s, like, a total bummer, right? They should be on Friendster.

As I mentioned, I will have all of the links to the books that we discussed and pictures of the covers and links to the short story and, of course, places where you can find Sherry Thomas.

But in the meantime, on behalf of me and Orville, all of my cold medicine, and all of my tissues, and everyone here, we wish you the very best of reading. Have a great week, and thank you once again for joining me at Smart Podcast, Trashy Books!

[dance music]