295. Inclusive History, Magical Writing, and Fan Art: An Interview with KJ Charles

[music]

Sarah Wendell: Hello, and welcome to episode number 295 of Smart Podcast, Trashy Books. I’m Sarah Wendell from Smart Bitches, Trashy Books. With me today is author and editor K. J. Charles. We are heading overseas sort of digitally. This week I am chatting with K. J. Charles about a lot of things. She started out as a Mills & Boon editor and then moved to writing, so she has a lot of perspective on the writing and editing process. We discuss plot, character, use of language, editing, and writing romance, especially in various historical periods. Now, some of the audio is a little bit muddy with the recording, and my apologies for that. I did my best to clean it up, and I hope it works for you. We also discuss what plot and structure are doing in a story and spend even more time on examining what erasure does in historical settings. When people of color, people of different classes, and queer people are erased from history, that has consequences, and Charles has a lot to say about those issues, especially why it matters right now that history is being actively rewritten as entirely white, rich, cis-gendered, and heterosexual. You’ve probably heard me talk about that before. Other topics we discuss include fan art and works inspired by her books and characters. She has a whole gallery; it is so cool. We also talk about the use of magic in historical settings, worldbuilding rules that make for effective stories, and answer the question, is there such a thing as correct use of language? Spoiler: in her opinion, no. We also talk about the importance of Own Voices in LGBT romance and in historical romance and of representation of accurate history. She also discusses a very important distinction: the distinction between inclusion of diverse characters and writing experiences that are not one’s own.

I want to say a very large thank-you to the Patreon community for questions and enthusiasm about this interview. It is really cool when I say, hey, I’m going to be interviewing this author, and all of these people go, YES! And then suggest really cool questions.

And also, to Alexandra Vamp Addict: your genre list is freaking amazing, and it’s also extremely helpful to me, because you named things in a list that I hadn’t thought of in that order. Also, hi! How you doing?

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And now, without any further delay, let’s do this thing! On with the podcast.

[music]

K. J. Charles: Hello there. I’m K. J. Charles. I am an author of mostly queer romance, mostly historical, some of it paranormal, and I’m occasionally an editor, and I have strong opinions about things like historical romance, diversity, and not being a prescriptive editor, so ask me anything.

Sarah: Wonderful. You, you mentioned being a prescriptive editor. You’re both an editor and a writer. What is a prescriptive editor? And do you still do some editing?

K. J.: I do a little bit, not very much, mostly pro bono at the moment, if somebody needs a hand kind of thing. I’m, I’m not a prescriptivist. I, well, let’s start: I was an editor for twenty years in British publishing. I worked for Mills & Boon for some time. I actually got an editorial RITA there, which is quite fun. Now I’m nominated for an author’s RITA.

Sarah: Nice! Congratulations!

K.J.: Thank you! So I have been an editor for a long time, both commissioning and working directly on manuscripts, which has, of course, left me with very strong opinions, and particularly about the kind of editing that puts rules before the author’s voice, partly because I think that can lead to just really bad, clumsy writing if – for example, you get editorial fads such as editors who insist that you can’t use the word “was.” I don’t think I’ve tried to write a novel without using the word “was,” but it’s a, it’s a disaster to try and do and achieves absolutely nothing. But it’s so, it’s these little editorial fads that go through, and I get quite annoyed about them, because of course we authors who don’t have exposure to editors and who are very often working with small presses and who might not be in with publishing will just do what they’re told, and I think it’s very important for someone to stand up and say, well, hang on, let’s actually not try and squash authors’ voices because they’re not conforming to somebody’s style sheet. I think that applies a great deal to, you know, to marginalized authors in particular, who may well not have access to, to the business of publishing and who might not know that they’re actually perfectly entitled to say, no, don’t do that. There’s a magic word stet that means “leave my manuscript alone; I’m not making that change.”

Sarah: [Laughs]

K. J.: But people don’t know if they’re allowed to, to use it –

Sarah: Right.

K. J.:  – so I write quite a lot of blog posts in an effort to just help share a bit of information based on having spent twenty years on the other side of the fence.

Sarah: That makes sense. So in, in your perspective as an editor, you want to preserve and amplify the writer’s voice above any hard or rigid rules about grammar, structure, and content.

K. J.: My feeling is that meaning has to come first. You know, the author’s voice and the author’s meaning are more important than anyone’s manual of style. It’s only a manual of style; that’s one person’s opinion of how it ought to go, which is, it’s not handed down in tablets of stone.

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

K. J.: Well, I’ll give you an example: I’m, I am obviously British –

Sarah: Wait, what? No!

K. J.: No, I know, it’s a shocker, innit? You couldn’t have told.

Sarah: No. [Laughs]

K. J.: I, I, I’m a Brit, and I had written a book about British characters set in Britain, and I was being edited by an American editor, who picked up a use of a word and informed me that it was an improbable word to use because it was actually chiefly Scottish, and cited as her authority on this Merriam-Webster, which is an American dictionary. So that was actually an American using an American dictionary to tell a British author how British people speak. I find this problematic, and I’d find it a lot more problematic if Brit-, Britons were more of a marginalized culture. You know what I mean?

Sarah: Yeah!

K. J.: It’s not actually, yeah, it’s not actually all right to impose one particular style, one particular culture, and say, this is the only way English is spoken. That’s just not how language works. So I feel it’s quite important to allow for different diversity of expression, diversity of slang, diversity of different dialects and different cultures from the many, many countries that speak English in different ways.

Sarah: Interesting! ‘Cause we all do deploy English in very, very different ways.

K. J.: Extremely so, and I think it impoverishes us all if we don’t have a bit of an open mind and listen to what other people are saying, and people use language in wonderfully different ways, and it can be intensely satisfying. And I really don’t, I, I don’t, I very, very rarely find somebody, or books, that’s using English in a way that I can’t follow if I give myself a little bit of time to sink into it.

Sarah: Right.

K. J.: So, yeah, I, I, I think there’s, there, there’s a kind of, there is only one way to do it. There is a correct way. There’s no such thing as correct when it comes to language, so it’s just what isn’t used by the majority and what is comprehensible.

Sarah: Especially since it changes so quickly.

K. J.: Exactly, exactly. Well, I mean, the dictionary definition of literaturely, literally now includes figuratively.

Sarah: Right.

K. J.: Says it all. [Laughs] But, you know, that’s what literally means now. It’s become an intensifier, and you can argue, you can get upset about that all you want, but it’s, it’s how people use language, so –

Sarah: Right.

K. J.: – you might as well just live with it.

Sarah: So you mentioned that you were an editor at Mills & Boon. Is that what brought you to writing romance as well?

K. J.: No, not really. There’s quite a long gap. I was an editor there for several years, and, you know, it’s quite intense work. I was –

Sarah: Yes.

K. J.: – often editing seven books a week, which is, you know, you’d, you’d really be going at it, be-, because of course in that kind of publishing, it’s, it – ‘cause in those days, print was the primary; it was, e-books hadn’t really taken off; it was primarily print; and, you know, one couldn’t miss a deadline; and, you know, when you edit seven romance manuscripts a week and you’re that deep in it and you’re going through slush, I came of that, out of that, and I didn’t read romance novels for about ten years.

[Laughter]

K. J.: I couldn’t, oh God, talk about overstuffed. So it didn’t really dawn – in fact, when I started writing, I didn’t actually intend to write a romance at all. I had thought I was writing a fantasy novel and had no particular plans for there to be a romantic relationship and the, until the characters met one another –

Sarah: Right.

K. J.: – at which point it all went a bit off piece.

[Laughter]

Sarah: I meant for you to do this! Why are you doing that? Stop that! [Laughs]

K. J.: Well, it’s, on the contrary, it was like, you, there’s something you want to do? Go for it! Carry on!

Sarah: [Laughs]

K. J.: You know, it was a long time since I’d written anything. I wrote a couple of books when I, you know, a decade, fifteen years ago, and they, you know, didn’t take, didn’t get taken up, and then I had children, and then, you know, once my second child had stopped waking up screaming three times a night and I was actually feeling like a human being again, I just thought I’d like to try and start writing again. But, you know, I didn’t have this great idea. I just had a concept, and then, so once the characters went for one another and I was thinking, okay, apparently I’m writing a romance novel, just decided it was happening, was joyful, absolutely joyful.

Sarah: Oh cool! I have a podcast Patreon, and when I’m interviewing someone I always ask the, the supporters if they have questions, and I have so many questions from supporters of my Patreon that were so excited that I was talking to you, and Rhode actually asked me to ask you, which is first, plot or character, when you’re starting a book?

K. J.: Oh, that’s such a good question, but the answer is basically both, ‘cause plot is character in action, and characters are completely responsive, well, responsive to the plot, but how a character expresses themselves entirely depends on the plot.

Sarah: Oh!

K. J.: So I, when I’m writing it, it’s an absolute pull-me/push-you kind of situation. You know, if the plot is going that way, then the character is going to need to go this way, and is the character capable of going that way? And if they’re not, maybe I’ve got the plot wrong, but if they are, maybe I’ll push them a little bit further and just see how far I can take it. But it’s always a this-way/that-way balance. It all, it’s all got to support each other is what I’m saying –

Sarah: Right.

K. J.: – I suppose. It’s like a triangle: if you cut, if you cut one of the pieces out of it, the whole thing will just collapse.

Sarah: Right.

K. J.: And if you don’t acknowledge both sides of plot and character, then you’re just going to have an unsatisfactory book.

Sarah: Megan from my Patreon also asked me if I would ask you about how your years as an editor influence or maybe don’t influence your writing.

K. J.: Well, I think I’ve got a fairly, I’ve, I’ve got a fairly good grasp of structure, because a lot of what you do as an editor, particularly if you’re a slush reader, which I was at Mills & Boon, a lot of it is identifying the root problems with a book –

Sarah: Right.

K. J.: – which will – so you, you had to get very good very fast at delving into the substructure and saying, well, actually, the reason this whole thing isn’t a satisfactory romance is, you know, the underlying conflict isn’t strong enough; or, you know, all the conflict is external; there’s nothing actually holding them apart; or you know, this particular arc is unbalanced; we get all the change at the beginning half of the book and then nothing changes in the second half.

Sarah: Right.

K. J.: That kind of thing. So it’s learning to look at rhythms and structures, and being able to do that for myself, it’s not as easy as you might think, ‘cause when, once it’s my book, I don’t really see it as clearly, but I think that’s been quite a big advantage all the same.

Sarah: That is definitely something that I notice as a reader. Like, why am I no longer interested in this couple? Oh, ‘cause they’ve worked out all their tension, and now we just have to solve the rest of this other stuff that’s external that I don’t care about.

K. J.: Exactly, whereas if the, if the resolution of the couple’s conflict is more interwoven with the external conflict, for example, or if, yeah, you just delay their resolution of their conflict so they’re really hating each other even while they’re hunting the murderer down –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

K. J.: – and so on and so forth. And there’s just a matter of getting the balance right so that you, you never let the whole thing flap.

Sarah: Yes. So for a reader who isn’t familiar with your work, is there a way that you introduce your writing or introduce new readers if someone walks up to you at a signing and says, which one do I pick? Do you have a, a way of introducing your writing to new readers?

K. J.: Oof. I’d probably ask them if they like paranormal or not.

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

K. J.: If they like paranormal, then I will press The Magpie Lord on them because it’s my first book and it’s the first of a trilogy, so if they like that they can go off and buy lots more, which is always an advantage –

Sarah: [Laughs]

K. J.: – and – well, you know – [laughs] – eye to the main chance. So, yes, that’s, that’s a paranormal historical, whereas if they’re more into the non-paranormal, the more conventional historicals, perhaps A Fashionable Indulgence, which is the best of my Society of Gentlemen series, and if they’re open to periods that aren’t the Regency and Victorian, which I’m very keen for people to be open to, I have both an Edwardian non-paranormal and a 1920s paranormal.

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

K. J.: So, yeah, I’d pretty much just ask people, you know, what’s your period, and do you like it with magic or not? Everyone should like it with magic.

Sarah: I agree; everyone should like everything with magic, but, you know, not everyone does. That was actually one of, one of Megan’s questions for me was, how do you select the historical periods for your, for your stories and your research?

K. J.: Oh golly. Yeah, it’s completely random every time, it really is. It’s –

Sarah: [Laughs]

K. J.: I read a lot of history, and I get, well, I get, I get caught up in it.

Sarah: Of course!

K. J.: I get very caught up in things, and I’ll have – so with Think of England, I mean, that entire book – it’s seventy thousand words or whatever – was actually a shortening of the phrase, do you know the phrase “shut your eyes and think of England”?

Sarah: Absolutely, yes, I do.

K. J.: Yes. Yeah, well, it’s used a lot here, and my boss, I was complaining about having to enter stuff into a database, ‘cause I was still doing an office job then, and my boss told me, he says, suck it up and think England, and it suddenly occurred to me, firstly, that would be an amazing title for a book, and secondly, what kind of book would that be in an amazing title for? And then of course the answer’s got to be Edwardian; you know, the stiff upper lip thing. “Shut your eyes and think of England.” You know, it felt very natural that it would be an Edwardian book, so then I just had to work out a way in which I could warp the entire plot around so it would fit the title –

Sarah: Right.

K. J.: – and the time period. But, yes, that was the inspiration for that. And other ones, well, I wanted to write a Society of Gentlemen book, so I wanted to write because the Peterloo Massacre is such an important part of British history, and it’s one that gets completely erased and hand-waved in a lot of historical romance – well, most historical romance – which makes me quite upset, and, you know, I had very much just wanted to write that because it’s important. So, yes, it’s, it’s very much whatever is bubbling to the top of my brain, really.

I, I think that there’s so very much in the sort of mainstream of historical romance that ignores a lot of things that are extremely important in British history, and it’s, I, I find that actually quite problematic. I find it problematic that the working classes are generally almost completely erased. I saw an interview with an author once who basically said, you know, a, a rich person would have regarded their servants like automata, and, you know, there’s no reason why I should mention them, because my characters wouldn’t have noticed them. And first, in fact, it’s just not how human beings work and isn’t how those houses work, and secondly, actually, you know, my grandmother scrubbed floors in a big house, and I have views on people saying she was an automaton, you know?

Sarah: Right.

K. J.: I have very strong feelings. And frankly, you know, the, I think it’s disheartening when there’s class erasure. I feel it disheartening when there is erasure of the really significant numbers of people of color who’ve always lived in this country, and particularly in Georgian romance when there was probably thirty thousand Black people living in London, but you can read a Georgian romance and not see any evidence of that. The erasure of queer people, the erasure of Indians in any Victorian – and it, and it’s, it’s an ongoing thing, because there’s been a kind of creation of this version of Britain which is incredibly white, aristocratic, and cis-het, and I, I don’t find that a pleasing fantasy at all. I find that a very worrying thing, that is seems to be a thing that so many people want.

Sarah: I, I agree with you. For me personally, as a reader who is Jewish, whenever I see this very, very specific portrayal, especially in American small-town-set contemporaries, where everyone is white, straight, cis-gendered, and this weird non-denominational Protestant Christian that’s, like, unspecified? Not only is that a turn-off, but I feel actively unsafe in that environment now. Like, I act-, I, I feel that that is, for me personally, alienating, and I cannot imagine the pain – actually, I can – of seeing the fact that you, you’ve been living in a place for generations, but you’re not portrayed in any of the fiction about it, and certainly not in the fiction that, that is deliberately about happiness. You’re not there. What the hell?

K. J.: Yeah, exactly. You know, if – well, when you see people saying, oh, well, it doesn’t matter about dukes; it’s just, it’s just fulfilling a fantasy, and fantasy of what? Fantasy of everyone being rich and white and cis-gendered heterosexual?

Sarah: Right.

K. J.: That looks like a fantasy. I saw, someone a few years ago commented that a lot of the British-set historical romance is basically hidden, disguised plantation romance?

Sarah: Ohhh!

K. J.: Yeah, that’s what I thought. Effectively, it’s like saying, oh look, look here; we’re all white and, you know, you needn’t think about awful, difficult things like slavery, but, yeah, everyone’s rich, and you needn’t think about where the wealth comes from. You don’t think about how they got their money; it’s just this floofy dress playground. And actually, my country’s history is not a floofy dress playground or anything like it, given not only the amount of harm we did, but also, actually, the amount of diversity and the amount of difference and the amount of interesting humanity we had here, and, you know, not to get all fussy about it, but I actually do quite resent having it rewritten for us by this very predominantly American strand of temporally dislocated whiteness, and I don’t like that, and I’m really glad that there’s so much change and people trying to do better, because I, I feel like that’s a trend that needs to burn itself out any time soon.

Sarah: [Laughs] Well, I mean, as Kathe Robbins from RT points out, we’ve been writing about the Regency, like, ten times as long as it actually existed.

K. J.: And there’s an awful lot of rest of the world, and there’s an awful lot of other time periods, and so many of them are so much more exciting.

Sarah: Yep.

K. J.: You know, there’s, I, I want to read about new things. I don’t want to read about, basically, billionaires in funny hats –

Sarah: [Laughs]

K. J.: – which is what your average duke is. I want, yeah, if I’m going to read a duke, I really, really like to read a duke that actually grittily engages with grotesque privilege, for example, and where the money comes from, and what you would do if you were a decent human being.

Sarah: Right.

K. J.: But actually, I’m, I’m much more interested in reading, oh, I don’t know, a businessman, for example. There’s a wonderful romance by Farah Mendlesohn called Spring Flowering, which is, it’s f/f, and she’s really set it in the sort of working middle classes, so the daughter is, the heroine is the daughter of a vicar, and then she goes to stay with the industrialist family in Birmingham. It’s fascinating! It’s one of the most interesting books I’ve read in ages, because it’s actually engaging with real life in a knowledgeable fashion.

Sarah: Oh, that’s interesting! I hadn’t heard of that book. Thank you!

K. J.: It’s a, it’s a great one, and you don’t get enough f/f historicals –

Sarah: No.

K. J.: – and I’m, I was very taken with that one.

Sarah: Oh, it’s very true.

K. J.: And you know, for me, if, in the field of historical romance, I think pretty much all the interesting stuff at the moment is not being set in Britain. You know, Alyssa Cole’s Extraordinary Union and A Hope Divided, and lots of the other authors. I mean, obviously Beverly Jenkins, Piper Huguley – you know, there are authors who do really, really good things, but set in, actually, America and writing really interesting histories –

Sarah: Yes.

K. J.: – which I think just has so much more potential and interest, and I’d love to see it extended more. You know, Lydia San Andres who writes books set in the sort of –

Sarah: Caribbean.

K. J.: – Caribbean, yeah. Yes! More of that, please! Loads more of that!

Sarah: [Laughs]

K. J.: Because it’s interesting. It’s, and it’s, and it’s actually, you know, giving me a different society, which is what I go to books for. I don’t want to see, I don’t want to see a made-up version of the place where I live, but, you know, just the place where I live is not enough.

Sarah: With your books, you’ve written both male/female and male/male pairings. What are you working on now?

K. J.: I’m actually going, doing my first female/female, my first big one. I’ve written a short story, which came out last year, but it’s a bit of my Green Men series, which is paranormal set in the 1920s.

Sarah: Ooh!

K. J.: So the first one is Spectred Isle, which is the RITA-nominated one.

Sarah: Congratulations!

K. J.: And then the second one – thank you, thank you! – and then I got to have a bit of trouble with it, ‘cause it was going to be different. It was going to be a male/female romance, but the, the hero in Spectred Isle, his cousin retur-, his dead cousin returned as a ghost, and she just would not go away. I mean, she was basically haunting me, and I decided she’s, she basically needs a story, so I’m not only writing f/f, I’m also writing kind of living dead, which is a bit of a – [laughs] – bit of a challenge, but I’m looking forward to it.

[Laughter]

Sarah: So one of the questions that Rhode asked me to ask you is, your embracing and deliberate choice to write characters who are not of your demographic and background amid the clamor for more Own Voices writing, and she wanted to know, how do you research different characters and different backgrounds to make sure that you’re staying true to the history and origin of those people in the places that you’re writing about them?

K. J.: A lot of reading and sensitivity readers.

Sarah: Right.

K. J.: I mean, I think it’s so important, especially with characters of color. I will absolutely always have sensitivity readers, because I just think, you know, you can’t assume you know other people’s experiences, and yeah, reading’s important, reading books by authors of those demographics, reading history, but actually, you know, there’s no substitute for having a human being read over it and say, you know, you missed this –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

K. J.: – that doesn’t ring true; you did that wrong. And I’m very conscious of not, you know, I’m not writing Own Voices. I’m very aware of that, but I, what I, what I try to do is, I want, I want to write diversely because, frankly, you know, this is the world I live in.

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

K. J.: I don’t live in one of these all-white small towns that may or may not exist. You know, there’s forty-eight languages spoken at my children’s school. I live in north London; this is, this is the world I’m in. But I try not to write someone’s experience. You know, I, I write characters who are going off on road trips –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

K. J.: – or magical policemen, or I try and make them diverse characters because that’s the world. I try not to say I’m speaking for people to, to be – for example, I, I wouldn’t write a coming out story, because I don’t think that’s up to me to do so, if you see the distinction.

Sarah: I do, yes. It’s, it’s about writing in a way that accurately captures the world that you’re in, which means that you’re going to see not just white people. Like, it’s just a fact. And it’s actually kind of startling that the idea of writing people of color in different historical settings is such an, an innovative or new or surprising aspect, because it’s not been done that long for, not been done that way for so long.

K. J.: Yeah, and it, yeah, it should go without saying; it really should go without saying. And, you know, I’m not – yeah, I, I think it would be grossly inaccurate if my historical romances all centered on white people. I mean, I just think that would, that would just be wrong. So, yeah, this, this feels like just writing the world as I see it, just writing the world as it was. You know, I’ve just, I’ve just finished a novella set in 1875, and to write that, and to – it’s set in London in 1875 – if you write that and you’re ignoring the fact that a lot of people there were Indians and the relationship with India was front and center of people’s minds, then you’re not, you’re not really writing 1875.

Sarah: Right.

K. J.: Yeah, so I, I, I feel less – there’s, there’s got to be a balance, but I, you know, I also twitch a bit whenever people sort of say, why do you write stories about gay people? Why do you write characters of color? No one’s ever said to me, why did you write a story centering a white person?

Sarah: Right, of course.

K. J.: You know, and, and yet – yeah. So I, I, I feel one, one day, we will all be able to write exactly what we want, and nobody will sit down and feel it necessary to ask why, and may that day come soon. [Laughs]

Sarah: Yes, it’s, it’s like a constant refrain of, oh, strong women characters, strong female leads. Uh, yeah. ‘Cause –

K. J.: Yeah, well, exactly!

Sarah: It’s ‘cause reality! [Laughs]

K. J.: So it’s reality, and the, I, you know, I, I do, I am a, I’m vividly conscious that I’m not writing within my lane, and, you know, one of the other things that you try to do is you make sure you get out there and read and support the people who are, because that’s the only way things are going to change, with Own Voices writers and marginalized authors being able to do exactly what the heck they like.

Sarah: Mm-hmm. Yes, I agree. Now, I wanted to ask you about worldbuilding. You add, as you mentioned, a bit of magic to a lot of things, and you have plots and stories where the magic and the history are very deeply integrated. What are your tools for worldbuilding that keep the magic within established rules? Do you have any tips or advice for someone who’s trying to write a magical world? Because you do it so well that it’s, like, almost, I remember reading one of your books and thinking, well, of course there was magic in this time period in England! I utterly believe this to be true!

K. J.: [Laughs]

Sarah: Well, why wouldn’t it be true? ‘Cause it’s just so well integrated into the backdrop, of course it was true!

K. J.: Oh, I’ve, I’ve, I don’t know if I’ve got any tips and tricks. I think you’ve got to have a strong sense of what it is you’re doing, and you have to be, you have to not let yourself cheat. I think that’s the thing. It’s very tempting, when you’re doing magic, to kind of tweak the magic system so that your hero can free himself with one bound, and this is bad.

[Laughter]

K. J.: Actually, maybe that’s it, actually. Maybe it’s knowing the limitations of magic and –

Sarah: Oh, absolutely.

K. J.: – what’s, what’s the price? What’s the downside? Where’s the, where’s the dangers? What does it do to you? I mean, with the, my Charm of Magpies trilogy, one of the important things to me was that it’s addictive and corrupting, for example, and I, I think always power corrupts, and I think you, you forget that about magic at your peril.

Sarah: Right.

K. J.: So that was, that was something that – yeah, it’s those kind of things. It’s being very conscious of how it works in the world and that it isn’t a free pass for doing anything you want to necessarily.

Sarah: Right, and that it has a, a penalty. There’s an upside and a downside.

K. J.: There’s always a price. Yeah, there’s, there’s got to be a price to power.

Sarah: Right, of course.

K. J.: There absolutely has to be. I must say, though, I, I’m, having switched back between paranormal and sort of more realistic, it’s not half upsetting when you’re trying to get yourself out of some short conundrum and you’re thinking, you know what, if my heroes could use magic, this would be so easy.

[Laughter]

Sarah: Listen, we’re just going to drop a little bit into this scene; no one will notice. [Laughs]

K. J.: Yeah, exactly. Go, go with it.

Sarah: That’ll be fine.

K. J.: Going to snap your fingers!

Sarah: So do you have a favorite pair of characters or a favorite book or world that you’ve written in? Are you a, do you love them all equally?

K. J.: I think I like them all in their different ways. There’s aspects of everything I write that, well, obviously, I hope I’m fond of it; otherwise, it would be immoral to release it, but, yeah, that, I, I did, I do love my Society of Gentlemen world, just because it was very, very closely integrated, which was quite fun to do, but because – for example, books one and two actually overlap, and there’s scenes that come in both books, just from different perspectives –

Sarah: That’s tough to write!

K. J.: It is. It was tough to write. It was particularly tough to write because I had the whole thing plotted out on Aeon Timeline, which is, like, timeline software, and I had these three really complex, integrated arcs going between the books to show the overlaps –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

K. J.: – and I finished book two, and I went on holiday, and I came back, and we’d been burgled, and they’d stolen my laptop, and I hadn’t backed up to the cloud.

Sarah: NO! No, no, no, that’s terrible!

K. J.: Yeah. Tell me about it. I, honestly, I was in tears. I was just – and mainly from kicking myself so hard. I now back up to the cloud.

Sarah: Oh my God.

K. J.: Yeah. I mean, at least the second, the, the next one doesn’t overlap as much. If that had happened on book two, I really would have gone screaming into the night. But, yes, so this is a very, very integrated trilogy, and because it’s so integrated, I ended up just getting extraordinarily close to all of the characters, so I am very fond of that one.

Sarah: And when you create a world that you really enjoy, it’s fun to go visit it and hang out in it.

K. J.: It is. It is, yes. It’s very tempting. It’s, it’s a temptation I’m trying to resist. I’m, I don’t want to go to any series too long, to find myself extending it too much, but yeah, yeah, the temptation to just go and splash around in this fun, enjoyable world is enormous.

Sarah: So you are self-publishing a re-working, a queer re-working of a classic.

K. J.: Yes.

Sarah: It’s, The Henchmen of Zenda is your book, correct?

K. J.: That is, yes. So it’s based on The Prisoner of Zenda, which is an 1895 pulp novel by Anthony Hope, which is sort of one of my favorites in a highly problematic way. Yeah, it’s, it’s –

Sarah: Yeah, I have a couple of those too.

K. J.: Yeah, well, if you’re into Victorian and Edwardian pulp, as I am, you have to just come to terms with the fact that a lot of it is really problematic, and, you know, I make no excuses, but The Prisoner of Zenda is, it, I mean, it’s not – it’s horrific at points. It’s mostly the attitude to women that is really, really grating, so it’s, the women are just these complete ciphers. They just flit around the place. There’s one moment where the alleged hero remarks to the reader, it never does any harm to make a woman a little bit frightened of you.

Sarah: Oh dear God! [Laughs]

K. J.: Yeah, I know. So you, you know – oh, tit. So I, I mean, and it’s a terrific romp of a read, and it’s highly enjoyable, and they made two great films, and it’s swashbuckling, and yet, and yet, and yet, so you’re, I basically, when I was given the opportunity to, well, I was asked to do this queers classics thing, and I thought, you know, that’s a book that I’ve always wanted to rewrite, so I went for that one, and I think it can safely be said that the narrator I have chosen for the book does not take that attitude to women –

Sarah: [Laughs]

K. J.: – and the women in the book get their own back in a big way. [Laughs]

Sarah: Yeah. That sounds much more appealing. [Laughs]

K. J.: Yes, I think so. I think so. But it was fun to do. I basically, I loved rewriting it from scratch. I basically took the existing plot, went with the premise that the original narrator was just some lying swine, and rewrote it as the true thing that actually happened, and it actually lent itself incredibly well to that, because clearly, the original writer is a lying swine.

Sarah: Right.

K. J.: Let’s not mess about. Yes. So, no, it was great fun to do. I enjoyed it enormously.

Sarah: When will you be self-publishing it?

K. J.: Fifteenth of May.

Sarah: Oh brilliant! Brilliant. I’m going to make a note.

K. J.: Yes, it’s not long. It’s mostly ARCs and so on out at the moment, and –

Sarah: Right.

K. J.: – getting quite nicely back. I think it’s, I think there’s a lot of swashbuckling these days. I think we’re sadly lacking in swashbuckling.

Sarah: Oh, I agree. Swashbuckling is brilliant!

K. J.: Yeah. It’s, I mean, if you can’t have fun with slashing swords and lots of innuendo-laden sword fights, what can you do?

Sarah: Right? Obviously. When you pulled the manuscript from Riptide, you also made an offer to help with editing. Is that correct?

K. J.: Yes.

Sarah: And how, have you, have you edited some of the other books that were pulled from that series?

K. J.: Yeah, it wasn’t from that series. I said what I would do is, because there were, when that happened with Riptide, there was a certain amount of people saying everyone ought to pull their books because their behavior is unconscionable, and that’s not really a very fair thing to say when a lot of authors, especially new authors, they’re, you know, not sure they can afford to do that. It’s, you know, quite costly –

Sarah: Right.

K. J.: – and it’s quite difficult, and going about it is quite problematic, so I said anyone who was held back by costal fear, I would, I would do one edit for that person and just get them, you know, get them started their own way so they could either submit to another publisher or self-publish, and someone’s taken me up, and in fact, just before this started, I was working on their manuscript, and it’s a cracker, so, you know, I’m –

Sarah: Oh, brilliant!

K. J.: So that’s quite nice. And I’m also working with an editor, an ex-Riptide editor as well, ‘cause one of the things that they were doing that I was very supportive of was taking on more editors of color, which is very much what we need in romance, for obvious reasons.

Sarah: Yeah!

K. J.: So, yeah, I, I, I think a lot of people suffered when Riptide imploded in that way, and I think the outpouring of help and support across romance that came out for stranded authors and stranded editors I think was very heartening.

Sarah: Yes, there’s – it’s very difficult to, to say to an emerging writer from any background, no, don’t take this opportunity.

K. J.: Right.

Sarah: No, don’t talk to these people. No, don’t do this, even though for their career, that could be a very, very large opportunity.

K. J.: It’s not, it’s really, really, it’s, it’s been very harsh, I think, on an awful lot of marginalized people, as well as emerging authors and, yeah, people who are both. It, it really did set a lot of people back quite badly, and I think the only thing we can do –

Sarah: Yes.

K. J.: – is sympathize, because the whole situation was absolutely impossible. Yeah, I, I think, yeah, the behavior that was going on there absolutely had to be called out and stopped, but it, you know, that’s had a lot of impact on people. It’s been a very unpleasant knock-on situation, and I think the more help we can give each other in trying to pull through that, the better.

Sarah: Yes, especially because now there are so many more options for making sure that your book reaches readers.

K. J.: Mm-hmm.

Sarah: It’s not like there’s just one path anymore.

K. J.: No, but it’s very scary. I mean, I didn’t self-publish for years. I wouldn’t, I, I had no desire to self-publish. You know, I’m, I’m twenty years lifetime publisher; self-publishing held no attraction for me whatsoever –

Sarah: Right.

K. J.: – and I probably wouldn’t have done it at all if Samhain hadn’t imploded, but that left me with seven books that I saw no reason to go with another publisher for, so I self-published them, and then that made me feel a lot more confident about putting my first new book out, which is Spectred Isle. But I, you know, I, I was reluctant even that one, you know. We shopped it around various publishers; they turned it down because nobody wants 1920s paranormal. Yeah, I, I –

Sarah: I like 1920s paranormal! [Laughs]

K. J.: Well, I’m doing 1920s paranormal, and quite a lot of people want 1920s paranormal, and, you know, the RITA judges liked 1920s paranormal, but there you go: apparently, you know, it did not get picked up by a mainstream publisher, so –

Sarah: Right.

K. J.: – I did it myself, and I’m very happy with the results, but – now. In fact, everything I’m doing this year is self-published, and that wasn’t my intention.

Sarah: Speaking of books that you publish, you have a lot of things to say about not saying anything about reviews.

K. J.: I do try and keep my trap shut; I really do try. I don’t always succeed, but I try. [Laughs]

Sarah: I love your flow chart so much! So much! How did I miss this flow chart? Oh my gosh! How did this flow chart come about? Is this, was this instructive for you or for other people or both?

K. J.: Oh Lord, I did that – that was a couple of years ago, wasn’t it? It was, I think it was when there had been a particularly big kerfuffle and very big-name authors angrily attacking Amazon reviews, and something about people using the word bullying a lot, which tends to –

Sarah: Yes.

K. J.: – really upset me, because the power imbalance is not there. I understand why authors feel bullied by reviews, but it’s very important to remember that that’s not actually the power relationship.

Sarah: Yeah.

K. J.: You know, I, I, I feel so strongly that unless a review – even if a review is pretty harmful, you’ve got to look at how many people are going to read it and actually think about it and – ugh! – and basically trying to stay away if it’s at all possible. Certainly, if a review is just saying, I didn’t like this book, then just let the person not like the book, for heaven’s sake! I mean, I, I don’t like loads of books. It’s almost my hobby, not liking books, you know? [Laughs] As with anyone who reads a lot of books. You know, let’s, let’s not be precious about this. People are entitled not to read books and not to finish them and not to like them and perhaps for stupid reasons.

Sarah: Yep. I, I also think that it’s very easy for authors to forget – and I, and I say this as someone who’s published my own books – it’s very easy to forget that readers are pretty savvy people, and we can tell when a review is more about the reviewer and that reader and their experience than it is about the book. I do a whole workshop on reviews and how to deal with them and how to manage them as a writer. You absolutely don’t have to read them, but more importantly, every negative review that has ever been published on my site in thirteen-plus years has sold copies of that book because someone reads that and goes, oh my God, I love all those things! Please excuse me while I buy this immediately.

K. J.: Absolutely! I mean, the, the, the one that really sticks in my mind for me was, I was looking through Goodreads, and I came across a book, and the review basically went, this is absolute arrant nonsense; the hero hijacks – the heroine – that’s right, he, he has some kind of heart attack, and then he hijacks a camel: one star. And I was like, hijacks a camel? I think you mean one-click.

Sarah: Yeah! [Laughs]

K. J.: And, and I said it on Facebook, at which point about thirty people wrote, yeah, that sounds brilliant, and the author actually had a big sales bump directly due to me picking up this –

Sarah: Yeah!

K. J.: – this one-star review. Well, you know, exactly! This –

Sarah: Yep.

K. J.: I mean maybe it’s a review that’s obviously a lot more damning, that says, yeah, this book really fails, and so on, but even if it does, it does! People are still allowed their opinions –

Sarah: Yep.

K. J.: – and getting upset because, if you, if you don’t want people to have opinions on your book, the correct thing to do is not to release your book.

Sarah: Yes.

K. J.: That is the beginning and the end of it: if you release a book, if you publish it, i.e., you put it into the public domain like that, you put it out for the public look at it, they get to have an opinion. You know, the only way to have people not have opinions is to, to keep it to yourself.

Sarah: Now, one thing I noticed on your website that I’m dying to ask you about is that you have a gallery of fan art about your books!

K. J.: I’m so lucky! I don’t know why people, so many incredible artists, like to do this, but I’m just so lucky, I just sit there in awe! It’s amazing!

Sarah: You have incredible fan art! Oh my God, and the Ned and Crispin comic panels – oh!

K. J.: Mila May is, Mila May, she is just so talented. She’s extraordinarily talented, but really, the – yeah, I mean, I, I, I worked with her very specifically and got her to do several things for me, and she’s absolutely marvelous. But honestly, there’s, there are a number of people who are out there just creating incredible, beautiful things which leave me in awe, because I can’t draw a stick man.

Sarah: Yeah, me neither. [Laughs]

K. J.: Yeah, and then people just come up with the most glorious things, and I alway-, I, I retweet them on Twitter and show them in my – I’m just so proud of it! It’s, it’s really one of the most unexpected and delightful things about writing books, that the, you get the, these ways that people respond to them. And I love emails; I love it when people come and tell me something about what a bit meant to them. But you know, seeing it visually, there’s just another layer of awesome.

Sarah: Yep. And do, do, is there a, a book of yours or a series of yours that has inspired the most artistic or written response?

K. J.: It’s the Magpies. I mean, that is my, their my oldest book, but, yes, it’s, it’s the Magpies; people get very, very into that one, I think ‘cause the hero has moving tattoos, which seems to catch people’s imagination.

Sarah: Yeah.

K. J.: And also, yeah – but all, all these things, yeah, it’s, it’s funny how they work out. I got some of the most interesting stuff for Society of Gentlemen, because, oh, somebody did – Hattie Grace, their name is – they did these pen and ink drawings of the two heroes of A Seditious Affair that basically just look like drawings of the time. They’re just extraordinarily beautiful –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

K. J.: – you know, and absolutely visualizing my characters in the most perfect way. Yeah, I’m, I’m, it’s, it’s magic. It makes me so happy.

Sarah: [Laughs] I think people – I have that same sense that people creating in response to something that you have created is so inspiring.

K. J.: Mm, really, yes, it is.

Sarah: It really is.

K. J.: What, oh yes, and, you know, when people – I, I don’t read fanfiction, but I know people write fanfiction about my stuff, and again, it’s just, the knowledge that people are picking up your imagination and running with it and creating more. I mean, there, there’s no greater compliment, really, is there?

Sarah: No. And so you don’t, you don’t mind that people write fanfic based on your work. That doesn’t upset you.

K. J.: Not at all, as long as they don’t send it to me. I think there’s massive issues that would start to pop up if I started reading it –

Sarah: Yes, of course.

K. J.: – but for, but if people are writing it and they’re not attempting to sell it – which would also be a massive issue – if they’re writing it for their own pleasure and that of their friends, then more power to them! Well, you know, I think that’s marvelous.

Sarah: That’s very cool. I know there are many writers who have very strong feelings against fanfic, and it, it’s interesting to hear you talk about how much it, it’s inspiring to you that people are creating based on your imagination, though I understand the boundary of not reading it; that makes complete sense.

K. J.: That would be really problem-, I mean, for me especially, with an ongoing series –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

K. J.: – if somebody came up with an idea and then I thought, well, actually that’s a really good idea, that would be a terrible thing, because there might be, end up making or being influenced by somebody else’s idea, and that would be an absolute mess.

Sarah: Right.

K. J.: If it gives people pleasure to read my books, that’s brilliant. If it gives people even more pleasure that they can write stuff and that gives their friends pleasure to have that shared, then, yeah, I have absolutely no objection. And in fact, I know I’ve got readers through fanfiction, because people will say, you know, this is a great fic; what’s the book it came from? And they’ll go back to my work. Suits me!

Sarah: So the, the question I always ask my guests is if you have any books that you would like to recommend that you have enjoyed recently?

K. J.: Oh Lordy, yes. Let me see. My minds going to go back – I’ll tell you who I’m, two authors I’m absolutely glomming at the moment: Talia Hibbert, who is a British romance author of contemporary –

Sarah: Yes.

K. J.: – m/f. My goodness, my goodness, she’s good! A Girl Like Her is absolutely tremendous! If that’s not Book of the Year everywhere – so good. It’s got this absolutely adorable, you know, big, powerful, total wonderful cinnamon roll of a hero, and the heroine is, she’s on the autistic spectrum, she’s fat. Neither of those are relevant to the plot; that’s just who she is. She’s got the most wonderful sense of humor. Oh, it’s, it’s a magical book. I couldn’t recommend it more, and there’s going to be more in the series. Everything by Talia is great, but I’m, I’m, that one in particular was marvelous.

And then I’m also hugely into Mina V. Esguerra, who is a Filipina author. I’ve been reading a lot of Filipino romance, basically because I’ve been glomming all of her Chic Manila series. And they’re, I mean, they’re just, they’re just lovely! She writes these wonderfully feminist heroines and some great situations, and you don’t have to read them in order, and there’s about nine of them, and I think I’ve gone through them in less than a month, honestly.

Sarah: Wow!

K. J.: Yeah, I know. I’ve been absolutely powering through them and then reading others, because they’ve got a very strong thing called #romanceclass, which is a very strong group of Filipino romance authors, and, yeah, everything I’ve read has been terrific, absolutely terrific! So You Out of Nowhere by Jay E. Tria as well, which is a slightly sexier one than most and, you know, wonderful romance. So I’ve been, I’ve been enjoying those. I’ve been reading the Decades series, which is African-American romance, one per decade from 1900 onwards, and if you’ve come across that –

Sarah: That is a great idea!

K. J.: Yeah, they’re, they’re, that’s, that’s been coming out. I’ve liked the – oh God, I’m trying to remember the – Love’s Serenade, that was one I really liked, which was, I think, 1910, and then the one after that, that was set in Harlem Renaissance as well. So, you know, it, it is such a good idea. I’m trying to think of all the other things I’ve been enjoying at the moment. I have been reading a lot more romance. I, I tend to go in phases when I’m reading romance, because if I’m in the throes of a book I can’t really read it, and I go off to science fiction, and then I go between books, and I go back to romance. One thing I read, if you’re into paranormal and fantasy, is The Glamour Thieves by Don Allmon, which is just this ridiculously high-octane book with elves and orcs and guns and mages and things exploding and masses of sex on the bumpers of cars, and that was –

Sarah: Oh!

K. J.: – terrific fun.

Sarah: Ooh!

K. J.: Yeah, it was a good laugh. And still trying to think what else has leapt to mind at the moment. I think those are the ones I’ve been squeaking and yelping about on social media.

Sarah: [Laughs]

And that brings us to the end of this episode. I hope you enjoyed that interview. I want to thank K. J. Charles for hanging out with me.

This week’s podcast is brought to you by Lone Rider by Lindsay McKenna. There is nothing more rugged or iconic than a cowboy riding alone in the expanse of the American West. Luckily for our hero, he won’t be alone for long, so saddle up and get ready to hit the trail with an uplifting read celebrating love and freedom as two wounded souls back from war find a healing connection. Lone Rider from New York Times bestselling author Lindsay McKenna is on sale now wherever books are sold and at kensingtonbooks.com.

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Coming up on Smart Bitches, Trashy Books this week – you did know there’s a website that goes with the podcast, right? I mean, if you didn’t you can come hang out with us, ‘cause we’re always doing a thing. Always doing things. So this week our movie discussion of the synthesizer-drenched fantasy romance that is Ladyhawke is Sunday the 22^nd at 8 p.m. Eastern. I hope you’ll come and join us to talk about this movie. I have outstanding screen caps of various people in the background with faces that indicate they have seen some things. We also have reviews of new books, a new Covers & Cocktails, our Tuesday edition of Help a Bitch Out, and this week we have a giveaway. We are each giving away grab bags or boxes of new books. Often we get duplicate copies, duplicate finish copies of books, so we’re assembling them into sets. You can enter to win one. It’ll be a mix of genres, mix of formats, including hardcover, trade, and mass market paperback, and at least five books per box. You can enter to win beginning Monday the 23^rd of April at smartbitchestrashybooks.com.

And speaking of URLs that I say very quickly, all of the books that we talked about, as well as some of the links to thing we discussed, will be in the podcast entry, or the show notes, at smartbitchestrashybooks.com/podcast.

Okay, folks, it’s joke time. I mentioned that I love this joke. I love this joke so much! It’s just a little bit on the side of bawdy, but it’s adorable. Are you ready? Okay.

Where do little jokes come from?

Where do little jokes come from? Well, a dad joke meets a Yo Mama joke, and then they knock-knock.

[Laughs] Isn’t that adorable? That is from, I believe this is Lum1nar on Reddit, and thank you Lum1nar, because I believe that that person made up that joke, and that joke is just charming me unendingly. Like, I think of “and then they knock-knock,” and then I grin like a big goofy person. I love it! [Laughs] Knock-knock! Okay, pulling myself together to be a professional podcaster. Knock-knock! [Laughs] All right. All right, yes, back to, back to the outro, which is also a word, by the way.

On behalf of K. J. Charles and everyone here, we wish you the very best of reading. Have a wonderful weekend! Knock-knock.

[lovely music]