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[music]
Jane: Welcome to the Dear Bitches, Smart Authors podcast!
Smart Bitch Sarah: I’m Smart Bitch Sarah from smartbitchestrashybooks.com, and with me is Jane from dearauthor.com.
Jane: With us today is author Claudia Dain, who writes the Courtesan Chronicles. The Courtesan Chronicles are anchored by the character of courtesan and now countess Sophia Dalby. Each book is about a young woman of society who seeks out the aid of Sophia in choosing and obtaining the right mate for her. The story in the series is really about female empowerment.
Now with us is historical romance author Claudia Dain, who is currently writing the Courtesan Chronicles. Claudia, why don’t you tell us a little about your series?
Claudia Dain: Let’s see, what to tell you about the Courtesan Chronicles? It is a, a series of books, not a trilogy. I think most people like a trilogy, but I decided to do a series, and it’s based around Sophia Dalby, and I’ve referred to her as my anchor character. All the action is spinning off of her, and her character arc is the one that is holding the series together and that has the longest and deepest movement throughout the books.
Sarah: It is certainly a, a break from the traditional method of building a series, where –
Claudia: Yes.
Sarah: – you have a family or you have a collection of friends or you have a bunch of guys who went to school together. You have one character moving through society.
Claudia: Yes.
Sarah: Now, one of the challenges must be, because she’s a, a female and heroines are very difficult in terms of reader likability, one of the challenges must be making her continually interesting yet somewhat – I don’t know if I want to say redeemable – alluring.
Claudia: Well, she, she has to have an arc. I mean, she has to change and grow –
Sarah: Yes.
Claudia: – otherwise she can’t be, or then she’s just a, you know, she’s just a, a placeholder, and I didn’t want her to be just a, a caricature of a character. I mean, I think that Sophia is an interesting character, and I think she can hold the attention well as is, but my own personal interest as an author and what entertains me is watching a character be slowly revealed, the layers peeled back until you see their, their nasty core and how they’re, how they do – redeem isn’t exactly the right word, but how they do change and how they do have to get to the, the heart of themselves, and the reader gets to watch that process and hopefully rejoice and, and feel the journey with them. So it’s, the trick for me as – [laughs] – just, it’s, all of it’s a trick! I find it an incredible –
Sarah: [Laughs]
Claudia: – intellectual challenge and a creative challenge, which is exciting, but it’s, sometimes I feel like, why did I pick up this big, heavy load? That, to keep her constant enough to be interesting, because she’s an interesting character as she is, but she has to change a little bit in every book, new information has to be revealed about her in every book, and yet the books aren’t about her. I mean, they’re about the, the primary romantic couple, and that’s where the focus has to fall, because they’re still romance novels when all is said and done, and the romance is not her story.
Sarah: Yes, but, but at the same time, I just read – which one did I read? The most, the one that’s about to come out.
Jane: The Courtesan’s Wager?
Sarah: Thank you, The Courtesan’s Wager. I knew it was a W, and I was going to say Wish, and that wasn’t right. The Courtesan’s Wager, she’s like a Machiavellian fairy godmother.
Claudia: Yes. [Laughs] She’s the smartest person in the room.
Sarah: No question. She is, she has no compunction about using nefarious means to achieve her ends, but yet she seems to have, at times, a truly pure intention, even if half of what she’s doing is for her amusement.
Claudia: Yes. I would say her intentions are – and this is based on her, her innate personality, her, her nature, as well as her life experiences. Her backstory is crucial to understanding who Sophia is, and that is, is dripped out in each book. Her primary goal – well, one of many – is to help the women around her achieve some sort of power. That’s, her, her, she will always try to help a woman get what she wants, and that is really not for her end; it’s, it’s for theirs, and so, and that way, it’s, it’s not, it’s beyond her amusement. It’s, if you want, you’re allowed to say what you want, you’re allowed to want things, and you’re allowed to pursue them, and that is her message to all these women that she’s, that she knows in society. If they come to her and can even verbalize – [coughs] excuse me – this is what I want, then she is more than happy to say, then let’s go get that for you.
Sarah: I think that you hit up in three words what Jane and I both loved about this book, is women achieving power.
Claudia: Mm-hmm.
Sarah: And I know, I know Jane has a couple of questions about the, the power imbalance for you.
Jane: Well, one of the things that I found remarkable about your series is that it really features the female characters in prominence, which isn’t always the case in the romance genre.
Claudia: I agree.
Jane: So, why did you make that choice?
Claudia: Well, I think – [laughs] – the simplest answer is because I didn’t often see it in the female romance genre. I, I just wanted to do something a little different and sort of tell the story that wasn’t being told from a perspective it wasn’t being told from, and I don’t know why that is. I, I think that – certainly it’s a risk – I think that romance readers know what they like, and I like what they like. I’m a romance reader myself. They know what they like, and they tend to prefer the hero’s journey. That’s been my, you know, finger on the pulse. I really think they prefer the hero’s journey, and there’s a lot of talk of, you know, when you read the book, you want to fall in love with the hero, and I knew that when I was writing these books, the purpose was not to fall in love with the hero. The purpose was to watch the female get what she wants, and that’s a different ride. That’s a completely different reading experience, and I just felt it was ti- – I don’t know, I – how do you explain why something just bubbles up to the surface and you think, this, this is what I want people to hear and think and believe. I, I really want women to believe you’re allowed to have a, a desire, and you’re allowed to pursue it. You can have what you want, and you’re allowed to ask for it. I, that’s just what I believe, and I would love it if women reading romance novels would get this message, even drip by drip, that this is true for them as well.
Sarah: You can’t see me ‘cause we’re talking on the phone, but I would, if I wasn’t wearing a really sensitive microphone, I’d be doing a serious happy dance, because that’s just awesome! Thank you!
Claudia: [Laughs]
Sarah: Seriously, I’m so excited about the entire concept, because we are so weighed down by Be Nice culture, especially in romance, and here you have this woman who’s not nice –
Claudia: That’s right!
Sarah: – because it’s more important to, to, to want to achieve what you want. Oh, gosh, you’re so awesome! [Excited hum]
Jane: But it’s not, it’s not that Sophia is, is mean.
Sarah: No!
Jane: I mean, she’s not, she’s nefarious, but she does it for a, for a good purpose, and that is empowering other women so that they don’t have to go through what she’s gone through to achieve, you know, independence and happiness on her own terms.
Claudia: Right.
Sarah: Agreed, but she also does, through, through individual actions that would be perceived as Not Nice, because she has an exceptionally low bullshit tolerance, and I happen to just adore that about her. [Laughs]
Claudia: I, well, I love her. She’s the, she’s my favorite character I’ve ever created. I will see this about Sophia: that her backstory was so crucial in creating this person. One of the reas- – a person who can do these things, you know, how to make her believable within the historical context. For me, she’s believable because she is not like them. She was not raised in that culture, she is not one of them, she doesn’t think of herself as one of them now, so that all the rules that govern Regency society, she understands them very well, she’s lived in them, but they’re not her rules. It’s not her culture, so she can step out of it and say, well, I don’t care if you don’t like me. You’re not my people anyway.
Sarah: How delightfully and deliciously subversive.
Claudia: Yeah.
Sarah: Love, love! So happy!
Jane: So tell me why, tell us why you chose to tell that story, that, that concept within the historically, historical Regency period, because it seems like the getting what you want as a woman is more suited to a contemporary or even a paranormal story.
Claudia: Oh that’s easy to answer; it’s a boring answer. I, I have a historical mindset. I couldn’t write a contemporary or a paranormal if I wanted to. I love history, and I, I guess the challenge, I guess I believe, too, from my vast research, that women like this existed in the historical period. It’s just that – obviously, she’s a fictional character, and she’s larger than life, but to a certain degree, women like this ex-, have always existed. Why not tell their story? Why not write it from their point of view? I also think that, for my, because I prefer the historical setting – it’s really what speaks to me beyond all others – there’s a, there’s a Once Upon a Time quality to them that allows deeper truths to sneak in under that sort of fairytale covering, and I think that those messages are perceived more deeply, because in a contemporary setting it seems like next door and right down the street, and your, your guard is a little bit more up, and you’re not able to sort of swallow it in as much because you say, well, you know, I don’t know anybody like that, or that doesn’t seem true, but in an historical setting you think, hey, I’m going along for the ride. How do I know? This is long ago and far away, in a galaxy far, far away – you know, that sort of thing. That’s, I love the historical for that reason, that, that sort of fairytale quality it has to it.
Sarah: I’m, I’m, I’m very much the same as a reader. I, I will forgive any historical craziness. You could drive a Porsche through the Regency, and –
Claudia: [Laughs]
Sarah: – I’d be like, yeah, okay, go ahead, but when a contemporary doesn’t ring true for even the slightest reason, I get very irritable about it –
Claudia: Mm-hmm.
Sarah: – and I’m, I’m exactly the same way. It, it lends this sort of fairytale nostalgia to the entire setting, but because Sophia Dalby is such a, not contemporary-minded, but contemporary-accessible character –
Claudia: Mm-hmm.
Sarah: – I know women like that in my, in my social world. I know people like that, and to see one played out in a historical context – of course they’re not going to be written up hist-, in a history because well-behaved women never make history.
Claudia: [Laughs]
Sarah: I think it’s rarely. I know I’ve seen that in a catalog: Well-behaved women never make history.
Jane: So within the pow-, within the power structure for a female in Regency per-, in Regency England, since no laws favored their independence, how do women, and how do you show women acquiring power, independence, and satisfaction in their lives?
Claudia: Well, within the historical context – and this is truly why it fits so well into a romance novel – you got married, or you were independently wealthy. That was it. I mean, you could, you could arrange legally to have money that was just for you and that no one could touch, which Sophia does, and you also married well, and by marrying well, you can define it however you want. In my novels it’s, the person is good looking, rich, and devoted to you. So –
[Laughter]
Sarah: That’s a trifecta of complete awesome. Yeah, I’m down with that.
Claudia: So, I mean, and that works in any time period, so – [laughs]. It, it’s just, that, that is very true to the time. I don’t have, I mean as far as, I mean, I, I really love histor-, the history of everything, and the history I believe – course, I’m prejudiced, it’s my book, but I believe it’s very accurate – these women are very typical in these romance novels. Even Sophia is logical, given her life history. There is, she, they don’t, these are not women who want to be nuclear, you know, chemists. They’re not secretly spies. They’re not – they’re just women who are trying to make a good marriage, and Sophia’s helping them to do that, finding that, a guy who’s devoted to you, who loves you, you know, loves you, he’s good looking, and he seems to be the one you want or, or else the one I think is really the better one for you and in the, in the classic matchmaker sense, so in that way, the books aren’t very remarkably radical, because these are just women who want to get married!
Jane: One thing I think is interesting, now that you bring it up: you really do make the men prove their devotion in somewhat humiliating ways.
Claudia: [Laughs] Well –
Sarah: It’s like, it’s like it’s, it’s like back in the Old School romances, the hero would have to grovel because at one point he was a complete hose-beast –
Claudia: Right.
Sarah: – and at one point in Old School romance, there’s the groveling scene. Now it’s like the, the, the more updated version of a historical romance hero: he has to make a complete fool of himself for love, and it’s just delicious!
Claudia: [Laughs] Well, maybe I’m Old School! I believe, I mean, I’m a woman in the twenty-first century who believes if you want me, you’d better, you know, work at it. I mean, I’m not just going to, you know, I’m not going to be your 11:00 p.m. booty call! You know what I mean?
[Laughter]
Claudia: I mean, you’d better work at it, honey! I’m not just, I’m not just hanging around waiting for you to pick me up off the shelf! That’s my, my worldview –
Sarah: Yes.
Claudia: – and that is so coming through in the books.
Sarah: And when we title this podcast, it will be Claudia Dain: Not Your Eleven O’clock Booty Call.
[Laughter]
Sarah: Okay, well, one, one question before we wrap up: what’s next for Sophia Dalby?
Claudia: Oh! How to answer that? I hate to be boring, but more of the same. That’s a terrible, terrible ad for myself, but more revelation of who she is, more pain for her, and more wonderful hookups – [laughs] – in the Regency time period.
Sarah: Excellent!
Claudia: She’s going to be, she’s going to be helping people get what they want.
Sarah: Excellent.
Jane: Well, let me ask one last question then: do you have a story planned for Sophia at some point?
Claudia: Yes, I do.
Sarah: Okay, well, tell us all of it right now!
[Laughter]
Claudia: Well, I will say this: it’s, by the ti-, if you’ve read even, I’m assuming, I hope this is true, but if you’ve read even two of the books, any of the two, you’ll know that Sophia’s simmering love interest is Lord Ruan –
Jane: Right.
Claudia: – and he is –
Sarah: And he is smoking!
Claudia: – he is smoking, and he is so right for her in every way! And their love story is going to be slowly dribbled out through the, as a secondary through all the other primary romances, and then they will have their own book, and that will be the final book of the series.
Sarah: I’m fanning myself. It’s going to be so great!
[Laughter]
Claudia: It is! He’s adorable. I just love him!
Sarah: Thank you so much for joining us. It was, it was really, really a pleasure to talk to you.
Claudia: Thank you! I had such a ball.
[music]
Sarah: The next book in Claudia’s series is The Courtesan’s Wager, which is going to be published by Berkley on February 3rd, 2009. What makes this, these books so fascinating is that theme of female empowerment, because both Lady Dalby and the heroine of each novel in the series go out and seek what they want and actually maneuver through society with the intention of accessing what it is that they want. They’re already operating and choosing to operate with a great deal of autonomy and agency, and it is just enthralling – and it’s almost shocking as I look at my own reaction – that I’m so not used to seeing heroines do that.
Jane: The theme series is really revolutionary in that it ta-, it, it’s a story told and a series told from the female point of view. I mean, you do get male points of view throughout the story, but the story is primarily the female journey, and that’s really exciting for me as a female reading romance.
Sarah: Also, because the character of Sophia Dalby is unlike anything that we’ve seen in historical romance, because she has a great deal of schemes going on at any given moment, and she is in-, incredibly amazing to just behold because she’s not a stock character, she’s not any of the main historical archetypes for women. She’s not a virgin, she’s not a crone, and she’s not a mother. She’s, she’s actually a parent, but she’s not fulfilling any of those roles. She’s acting in a completely new way within the standard tropes of romance. I generally shy away from making recommendations such as if you like this, this is a book that will appeal to you, because, well, I’m often wrong, but I do think that readers who enjoy the kickass female heroine that is so popular in paranormal urban fantasy and is so popular in suspense, the, the female who is going to do her thing, and you will not stop her, there’s a lot of that autonomy in, in action, in, in Dain’s novels, so if you’re curious about a historical romance novel that does things a little differently, this is something you definitely want to check out.
[music]
Sarah: If you’ve got any feedback or questions for Jane or Sarah or topics to suggest, we’d love to hear from you. You can email us at [email protected]. That’s S-B for Smart Bitch, J for Jane, and podcast for podcast at gmail dot com. We’d love to hear from you if you have ideas or questions you want to ask us. We might answer them in a future podcast or answer them on our websites, but either way, give us an email; we’ll definitely read it.
[music]
This podcast transcript was handcrafted with meticulous skill by Garlic Knitter. Many thanks.