704. JQ Editions with Julia Quinn

Sarah Wendell: Hello and welcome to episode number 704 of Smart Podcast, Trashy Books. I’m Sarah Wendell; my guest this week is Julia Quinn. We are going to be talking about JQ Editions, her new subscription service that is creating special limited editions of historical romances. Now, I’ve been writing about this since it was announced, and so I got to ask all of my questions and also some of yours. Along the way, we are going to talk about the historical romance genre, the administrative mayhem of putting together a project like this, and the practicalities of creating special editions of beloved books. Plus you, you will get to hear my live reaction when she tells me some of the 2027 titles.

Now, we were recording internationally, so there are times when the edit is a little choppy, and my apologies for that.

I will have links to all of the things we talk about in the show notes, and you know where that is, right? Smartbitchestrashybooks.com/podcast under episode 704.

I have a compliment this week, which is so delightful.

To Stringthing: Research has indicated that there are seventeen different facial expressions that convey happiness – this is true! Your friends and loved ones already know this, because they have experienced all seventeen, plus four undiscovered ones, because of you. You scientifically provide visual evidence of happiness.

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Most of all, thank you for listening. I’m glad you’re here!

So, shall we get started? On with my podcast with Julia Quinn talking about JQ Editions and historical romance.

[music]

Sarah: Would you please introduce yourself to the people who will be listening and tell them who you are and what you do. Brand-new debut author that no one has ever heard of.

Julia Quinn: My name is Julia Quinn –

Sarah: [Laughs]

Julia: – and I used to be a brand-new debut author in 1995. I was, in fact, I, I was kind of a notable brand-new debut author then because I was really the youngest one at the time. There were, there were a couple authors who had, also had their first books come out really young at the time; it would be Teresa Medeiros –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Julia: – and Lisa Kleypas But when, when I came out, I was absolutely the youngest, and, and, you know, there were a lot of people sort of eyeing me and being like, Who’s that? And people would think I was the editorial assistant at meetings? So it’s just really funny now that I’m, you know, now I’m kind of like one of the old hags of romance because I, you know, ‘cause for so long I felt like my professional identity was a little bit wrapped up in being, like, the, the young one.

Sarah: Yes! I completely understand!

Julia: And so now, you know, I look and I’m like, I’m not even remotely the young one anymore. [Laughs] And neither are you, Sarah.

Sarah: No, believe me, I joke literally all the time about how I sit on the porch of the Romancelandia Old Folks Home in a rocking chair, and I’m like, Oh, are we talking about whether or not romance has to have an HEA again? Oh, we do that every five years. Let me just – oh, hang on one second! I got all my talking points ready. Like, it, I, it’s like a planet? Like romance is a planet, and we have arguments that circle like weekly, daily, annually, every five, every ten. You know, it, it’s, it’s fascinating because the site just turned twenty years old? I’ve been, also, I’ve been –

Julia: I know, you’re, yeah, you’re an old hag of romance too!

Sarah: I’m an old hag of romance. I’m digging it. I like my old hag status. It’s pretty great.

Julia: Save, save room on a rocking chair for me. I will be there.

Sarah: Oh, big bench, it’s going to be great.

So congrats on JQ Editions!

Julia: Thank you, I’m super excited about it!

Sarah: Is this kind of like – so I’ll, I’ll give you a little behind the scenes. I was once at a meeting with your sister Emily, who was the chief designer be-, behind Smart Bitches’s redesign several, like a decade or more ago. And –

Julia: Yes, she is a designer, yes.

Sarah: – we were having a meeting about the website and she’s like, I need to tell you something, and you absolutely have to promise me you will not tell a word. And I’m like, Who am I going to tell? The whole internet? Like, No, I’m not – I promise. Like, if you tell me something and tell me not to tell, I will not tell. Also, I’ll probably forget. She goes, Julia’s books were just, just optioned by, by, by Shonda, Shonda Rhimes at Netflix. And my jaw just, like, hit the floor. And we were on one of those little bar tables with the really high chairs, and I’m, like, barely on my seat already. I nearly –

Julia: She was not supposed to tell you that!

Sarah: This was the day it was announced. It was like two hours before the – it was the day of, so do not, do not think that this was early. This was like the day of. And I’m like, Could you tell me more? And she’s like, Well, the information is embargoed until this time, but I’ll make sure that you get it. I’m like, Please? So right after it was announced, I was leading, or I was moderating a panel. I want to say it was this RT or RWA, one of the two.

Julia: I know for a fact it was RWA, because –

Sarah: RWA.

Julia: – I wasn’t there, and it was one of the first years I hadn’t gone.

Sarah: I was, I didn’t remember that part!

Julia: No, I wasn’t there. I was in Iceland.

Sarah: As you do.

Julia: As you do. Well, we were doing a family vacation, and we had gone to Europe and then, you know, we’d flown on Icelandair where you get those, you can do the stopover on the way back. So I was –

Sarah: Yes.

Julia: – actually in Iceland. And, you know, when I made the decision not to go to RWA that year – and I think I’d missed RWA maybe twice in all the years that RWA was a big thing – I had no idea that they were going to be announcing it during RWA. So it was really kind of funny that, you know, this massive announcement, not just for me, but for the entire romance world, happened at the romance world’s biggest convention, and I wasn’t there.

Sarah: So congrats on another – [gasps] – What?! moment, because when I saw that the JQ Editions was happening, I’m like, Well, of course! Of course, of course we need special editions of historical romance. Of course we need cool editions of the books that we love in addition to romantasy and all of the other special editions that are out there. Of course! But at the same time I was like – [gasps] – What? This is so great! So congratulations on yet another What?! moment.

Julia: Thank you! You know, I, I’m doing it for a couple reasons. Well, first of all, I should say I’m doing it with my best friend, Stephanie, which is super fun. You know, we went through a number of ideas of, we, we wanted to do something in publishing, and we wanted to do something with historical romance. We were really trying to go back and forth like What, what would work? Like if we, we thought, Oh, what about publishing eBooks? ‘Cause, boy, that would be a lot easier than doing special editions, I’m learning.

Sarah: [Laughs] Just a little bit.  You could, you could have been done by now!

Julia: You know. But, but that, for lots of reasons that wasn’t going to work. Anyway, so, kind of landed on this! Because I love pretty books. Bridgerton had been getting so many special editions. I mean, we might –

Sarah: Beautiful!

Julia: – have saturated the market; I don’t know. And, and people loved them, and I loved them. And I’m looking around, seeing, like, so many things are getting special editions, but no historical romances. And at the same time, you know, everyone’s saying historical romance is dying, it’s having trouble. And I thought, Okay, I, I really am kind of uniquely positioned to boost the market in some way. And this seemed like a great way to do it, to have, to, to both, to both kind of honor these books by giving them these gorgeous packages.

And almost all the books will be books that have come out already. You know, we are launching with The Last Lady B by Eloisa James, which comes out almost simultaneously to our edition. The, the trade paper that’s coming in the regular stores, I, I think it’s maybe a month or two ahead of us. So that one’s almost simultaneous.

But, you know, most of the rest of them are older books, books that I just love that have stood the test of time, or –

Sarah: Yes.

Julia: – or they’re just from the last few years, whatever. But we’re not doing originals.

Sarah: So how long have you been working on this? When did this idea generate? How long have you – ‘cause seriously, sitting on a secret like that, I’m very impressed. [Laughs]

Julia: …Well, the, the group of people working on it is very small, so it was easy to keep a secret. I think we started talking to publishers last summer?

Sarah: Wow! That’s very cool.

Julia: So it’s been a while, and you know, and, and illustrators, we, we, we have designed – actually, we’ll be, well, by the time this airs, we will have released the first three images. And I think you’ve seen, I gave you a sneak peek of two of them or all three? I can’t remember.

Sarah: Two.

Julia: Two.

Sarah: Two of them, because the third was not ready yet? The design element was much more complex, and you were like, Yeah, this one’s not ready, but here’s what the first two look like? And the degree to which I was like inches from my monitor looking at, like zooming in and looking at all the details – like, I, wow. Wow, they’re pretty!

Julia: Hold on! If you – I mean, I can email you the third one while we’re on here right now…

Sarah: I have somebody in my community, her name is Heather, and she loves Lord of Scoundrels. Like, it is – if a book were to be someone’s ride or die, that’s her ride or die book. She adores this book –

Julia: Yeah.

Sarah: – and she’s like, Did you hear? Did you hear? And I’m like, Well, I can’t say things because embargo, but yes, I have heard and I really am excited for you. And she’s like, Oh my gosh! [Laughs]

You remember, do you remember what the genesis of this project was? Like, I want to do something or I want to do this? Like, what was the start of this whole thing?

Julia: It was really I want to do something. And, and it actually came initially from my friend Steph, who has worked at Amazon and has worked at Shelf Awareness and has been in the, and wrote historical romances as Stephanie Sloan. And, and so she kind of came to me with the idea saying, Let’s do something. And I was like, Sure! That sounds cool, because, you know, at, at this stage, I, I’m really enjoying being able to do something new and different, but while still in the book world.

Sarah: Yes.

Julia: And so that’s really fun for me, and I thought, well, this’ll be, this’ll be exciting, and I’ll learn something new, and I’ll use a different muscle in my brain. Although, although I know the brain’s not a muscle; it’s a bunch of neurons; whatever. But –

Sarah: It’s still scary to do something new as opposed to the thing –

Julia: It is scary!

Sarah: It’s very scary to do something new.

Julia: But it’s exciting, you know, and, and it was like, you know, I can use, I have this bigger platform, probably the biggest in historical romance right now, and I can do something to shine a light on other authors. I mean, as of now, there are no plans to do any of my books.

Sarah: Really! Int-, well, I mean, you did mention that the Bridgertons have several, several –

Julia: Yeah.

Sarah: – several editions, including the one where the front looks like the house, which I think is just so pretty. That one is so gorgeous.

Julia: It is. Yeah, that one came out in the UK. And then the one that’s coming up now from HarperCollins makes not just a house, but like a whole sort of scene with, like, a carriage and everything.

Yeah, so, I mean, maybe someday we’ll do one of my older ones, but right now the plans are just other authors. And –

Sarah: That’s very, very cool.

Julia: Yeah, and the idea is that, you know, we’re serving a purpose for the people who want beautiful special editions, but also maybe for people who are historical-romance curious and are like, Okay, well, I don’t know where to start. All right, well, I’ll pick the ones that Julia Quinn says are good.

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Julia: So it’s curated!

Sarah: Yep!

Julia: Which I think helps some people, and, you know, I guess it is sort of more, more expensive than somebody curating something with mass markets, but mass markets are disappearing anyway.

Sarah: Yeah, mass market is, is unfortunately dead. It is –

Julia: Yeah.

Sarah: – it is done. It’s – and I think the reason why people say – and I’ve written about this – I think the reason why people say historical romance is dead is because mass market paperback is dead. And historical romance is in a slump, it’s kind of not doing great, but the authors who are still publishing regularly are in trade. And their audience has always been buying trade. And if you are a reader who thinks that historical romance is in mass market paperback and you see the complete absence of mass market paperbacks and historicals,
the, the, the reaction might be, Oh, it’s, it’s dead. It’s not dead. Genres don’t die, in my opinion.

Julia: I, I, I agree with you to some extent. I think there’s, I think that’s a huge part of it.

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Julia: I think that, you know, publishers didn’t move mass market to trade when it became clear that – I mean move historicals to trade when it became clear that mass market was dying. And, and so I think that it’s not just that people are looking and not seeing books, it’s that –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Julia: – people were, new people weren’t seeing them because they weren’t getting distribution. They weren’t – yeah, yeah! So, you know, it’s, it’s, it’s a vicious spiral. And so, you know, you have these publishers saying like, Well, we can’t move mass, historicals from mass market to trade because, you know, we’ve already trained all our historical readers to want mass markets and they’re not going to pay more for trade. And, but at the same time, you know, the, the, the mass markets aren’t getting space in Target! They’re not getting space –

Sarah: No.

Julia: And so…

Sarah: They’re, they’re simply too expensive to move around. The profit margin on a mass market is so slim as to almost be no-, nothing? It’s more expensive to drive them around and put them in places than it is to not do that.

Julia: Yeah! And so then you look and they’re like, Well, look, these books aren’t selling!

Sarah: Yes, exactly. [Laughs] Okay, but, do, but let’s look at why they’re not selling, yes? ‘Cause, you know –

Julia: Yeah! Maybe they’re not selling ‘cause you’re, they’re not getting any real distribution because they’re in mass market, and then authors get dropped.

Sarah: Looking at special editions, ‘cause that’s what I want to start with, what do you think draws readers to special editions of their favorite books? Are you drawn to special editions?

Julia: Yes. I mean, I, I love making my bookshelves look pretty. I mean, I love books; I love, I love to read books, and I love books as objects as well. And, you know, for so long, my favorite books to read for pleasure were as mass markets, which are wonderful books, but in many ways, they’re not very pretty, and they look funny on the shelf. And, you know, I remember I ran the book fair at my kid’s school for like a dozen years, and, you know, it, and it was a kick-ass book fair, let me tell you. We, one year we rai-, we sold twenty thousand dollars’ worth of books in three days.

Sarah: [Exclaims]

Julia: Oh yeah, we –

Sarah: Imagine, imagine being a parent, by the way, and being like, Oh, it’s my kid’s book fair – run by Julia Quinn! Holy crap! [Laughs]

Julia: I think half of them didn’t even know. And anyway, so, you know, we’d lay all the books out and, and they’re all on tables, display tables, and the mass markets always looked so sad. I mean, we didn’t have very mass, many mass markets ‘cause there aren’t that many mass markets in kids’ books, but we had an adult table too. And there would be a few things like, you know, we’d put out like Dune or something, which at the, you know, we had in mass market at the time, and it just looked so sad next to all the beautiful other books.

And, you know, so I, in some ways, you know, these special books, it’s just like, yeah, we get to see our books being treated as valued objects.

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Julia: And –

Sarah: Yep.

Julia: – and I think that’s lovely. Plus, they’re just also really pretty.

Sarah: It’s, it’s beautiful to touch them. It is like –

Julia: Yes!

Sarah: – adding senses to the reading experience. ‘Cause you’re right, the limitations of the mass market format, between the cardboard thickness of the cover, which is not very durable and is not going to hold a lot of color – remember when we used to have, like, holograms and gold foil and all kinds of stuff on the cover? Or, you know, you’d have a, a very basic cover with embossing, then you’d open up to a step back, and that step back might’ve been a different quality paper to hold on to those colors, ‘cause the cover was not going to get the, the, the paper of the cover was not going to get the job done. And the paper inside the book was also very, like, thin and not very durable. It was like, you know, a couple steps up from, like, Bible paper. These were not meant to be durable items that had a lot of tactile depth, no matter how much we embossed them.

But when you have, like, a special edition, especially if you had trade size or a hard cover
of a trade size, it’s so, like, a sensory experience. You’re seeing more colors; you’re seeing the book. You are touching this gorgeous thing. My theory about special editions is that they are both an artifact of how much an individual reader loves that book, like I love this so much, I’m going to buy a, an edition of it that I’m not going to read when I’m eating Cheetos. Like, this is a very special book, and I’m not going to have orange crusty fingers when I touch this.

Julia: That’s true.

Sarah: But also, I think it is an artifact of virality. You don’t make a special edition out of a book that no one has heard of? You make a special edition of, out of a book that has reached a lot of readers and gives, and it gives them this artifact of the virality that everyone shares in the experience of loving this book, and let’s make it more visually gorgeous to represent that experience.

Julia: When you’re talking about touching these, the, all the JQ Editions, at least the first three, are going to – so we’re not doing dust jackets. And instead, we’re doing the soft touch cover. Do you know what that is?

Sarah: It’s like a velvety texture?

Julia: Yeah! I can’t really describe it. It’s like it, ah – so anyway, anybody listening to this, if you want to know what a soft touch cover feels like, go out, you don’t have, I’m not saying you have to buy it, but the new Bridgerton special editions from HarperCollins, these are the ones that have the family tree on the end papers. That’s what’s called a soft touch cover. And I just, I pick these up; I’m just like – I mean, you can’t see me ‘cause I’m on a podcast, but I’m just petting them. I’m like –

Sarah: Oh yeah. It’s like the paper version of suede. It has this nice –

Julia: Yeah, maybe!

Sarah: – soft – I mean, not like an actual nap where you can change the color going up and down –

Julia: Yeah, there’s no nap.

Sarah: – but it has that beautiful tactile softness, almost like there’s a tiny fuzz on the paper. It’s very luscious –

Julia: Yeah, so that’s what we’re doing.

Sarah: – very luscious to touch.

Julia: We decided not to do the dust jackets just ‘cause, you know, they sometimes get damaged or they don’t get wrapped properly, and –

Sarah: They’re fragile; it’s hard to ship them. Yeah.

Julia: And actually, all the special editions that I’ve had, with the exception of one, have been, you know, naked hardcovers, no dust jackets.

Sarah: Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Julia: And this is coming, not just in the United States, I’ve had special editions in a number of other countries as well, and I’ve loved them all so much, I decided to go that way.

Sarah: So I don’t know if you can answer this. This is very nosy on my part, fully acknowledge this, but I am so curious, because I am very much a behind-the-scenes person. What is the logistical work like behind the scenes for you and your team and authors and agents and rights? Because you are, with the exception of Eloise James, you’re bringing older titles into a new edition. I imagine that this is an email chain with like nine hundred people on it, thirty-four different CCs, and, like, how much administrative mayhem was involved in this project?

Julia: You know, there’s a fair bit of administrative mayhem because there are two ways you can bring special editions to life. You can go through what’s called the special sales department, or you can go through the sub rights department. And what that means is if you go through the sub rights department, you’re, you’re licensing the right to produce a special edition, and you are producing that book yourself. If you’re going through the special sales department, the publisher will print the books and sell them to you as units, and they’ll print them using your art. And we kind of went back and forth a bit on how we were going to do it, and, and, and in the end, different publishers want to do it different ways. So it was –

Sarah: Wow! Interesting!

Julia: There was a lot of mayhem when we, we sort of did switch, and – yeah. So it’s, it’s confusing. And I’m learning. You know, and, and I had only been party to this on the other end, which is usually, the company, when, like, the deal’s done, saying, like, We have this deal and the cover’s already designed and blah-blah-blah-blah. What do you think? You know, when you’re like, Okay, great, whatever.

Sarah: Working on, like, the, two books from now, like, I, I don’t even know what you’re talking about. [Laughs]

Julia: Yeah. You know, so – so we’ve been trying to keep, you know, the, the authors, I think, a little bit more apprised than they would in normal situations, simply because, you know, I, I actually know all these authors personally. So I’ve been able to reach out a little bit and, and talk to them, you know. For example, with – let’s see an example. Okay, well, I’ll tell you right now, ‘cause I believe this information will be out by the time we air this: our first author of 2027 is Julie Anne Long.

Sarah: Oh my goodness! Is it Penny…

Julia: It’s Pennyroyal Green! It’s going to be the…

Sarah: I am so excited! [Squees] So excited! Okay, I love that series so much! Okay. Sorry –

Julia: I love that series.

Sarah: – I’m literally having a cow right now. My inner thirteen-year-old is losing her shit. Oh my God, I’m so excited for you. Tell me everything!

Julia: You’re going to lose more than that when you see the cover, because we really worked with Julie Anne Long to get really good stuff for this cover. So this is only one – we don’t have anything else designed for 2027, but we knew we were going to start – I mean, yes, 2027, that one, and so I reached out to Julie Anne Long, because, I mean, anybody who’s followed me for any amount of time knows how much I love her books. I think she’s such an incredible writer. Do not know why she hasn’t caught on more than she has, because she is so good.

And so my hope is that, you know, we’ll be around long enough with JQ Editions to keep putting these books out in the series. And – so anyway, talk to her and you know, we’ve got Easter eggs on the cover. We have the, the three-legged dog is on the cover, I mean, and we’ve got, you know, a wanted poster, and we’ve got Madeleine’s father’s pistol and – what’s it – a pocket watch, and – I’m blanking. It is kind of funny, though, because we did try putting something from the gallows at first, and we were like, Oh no, that looks like a noose. And we’re like, Okay – [laughs] – like, we can’t do noose…

Sarah: Let’s not do that! But how cool that you’re putting –

Julia: Yeah.

Sarah: – the iconography of the story on the cover. That’s so cool!

Julia: Yeah… So we have a lot of that. And then on the, the end papers for this particular one, the front end papers will be, you know, not, you know, a clinch type thing. And the back end papers will be a map of Pennyroyal Green. And that will remain through the entire series, but changing up a little because, you know, books are set during different seasons, so if there’s a book set in winter, the map will be in winter, and we might add different things.

And so, I mean, art, the artist that we have doing this particular series. I mean, she’s so excited. She’s committed; she’s like, I want to do all the books! You know, and so, and when we were picking out, like, lettering, she made sure the lettering looked good for the next few books. So we’re really thinking hard about this.

And I will say also, with the Lord of Scoundrels cover, if you look closely, we’ve got iconography of –

Sarah: Yes.

Julia: – the book in there on the front. I mean, they’re subtle because the, the book is kind of this lush black and grayish color, which to me felt very Parisian? You know…

Sarah: Right, it’s, it’s both Parisian and mysterious.

Julia: Yes! I, I wanted this cover to be bold. I mean, I feel like, you know, the current cover of Lord of Scoundrels are, are in these very soft pastel-y colors, which always puzzled me. So I wanted this to be very bold, and you’ve got, I think we have five different items on the cover of that one. We’ve got the, the pistol –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Julia: – and we’ve got –

Sarah: There’s a lamppost.

Julia: – the lamppost. We’ve got a fan, we’ve got gloves, and we’ve got the icon. And then on the back – oh, you haven’t seen the back! I don’t think. So the back is more of those great swirls, and then in the middle of it is like a big circle, which is to be the ruby cabochon ring?
Sarah: Ohhh-ho-ho-ho!

Julia: In the ring it says, I should like to see you try.

Sarah: I love it! Oh my God, the stickers and fan art –

Julia: And –

Sarah: – that will emerge.

Julia: Well, speaking of which, we are, one of things we’re offering in our Kickstarter – I think it might be one of the least expensive items, which is great – is a fridge magnet of that ruby cabochon ring that says, I should like to see you try, which I think is really great because it, like, it doesn’t necessarily scream book cover. Like, you could have it and it’s like an inside joke, like you could be like – yeah, so I love it. Yeah, I’m going to have like six of those.

Sarah: So when is the Kickstarter launching, and how is it going to be structured? How much of you, how much can you reveal?

Julia: So, well, the Kickstarter, the pre-launch goes up on January 13th. And Kickstarters have two different time periods: there’s the pre-launch and the launch. The pre-launch –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Julia: – is basically where you’ve got some basic information about what we’re doing. It doesn’t have the levels and pricing or anything like that, but it just says we are doing –

Sarah: Get ready!

Julia: Get ready; we’re doing this. You know, for us, we will have images of the books. You can see this and, you know, I’m trying to remember what we’ve got in there. We’ve got information with me just talking about, like, why I love each book and why we designed the cover the way we did, and, and also just saying, like, what you’ll be able to get, which is, you can get a one-year subscription –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Julia: – which is three books.

Sarah: And that will be 2026, right?

Julia: Yes. The three books in 2026, and they don’t come at once. You get three separate mailings.

Sarah: Right.

Julia: And those, I believe, are July, September, November. We’re going with odd months. And – or you can get the one-year subscription with, like, some swag. We, the swag is not an ongoing thing for us. Once, this is just sort of a special launch thing, but you can get three swag items. Each one has something to do with each book, although I believe we’re going to be mailing them all out with the first box – logistics and all that. Or you can buy the two-year subscription, which will be the first three books and then all six books in 2027. So you can get –

Sarah: Now –

Julia: – nine books.

Sarah: – you mentioned Julie Anne Long is part of 20-, 2027. Are you doing all of Pennyroyal Green through 2027? Are those all the 2027 books?

Julia: No. So right now, you know, the next Pennyroyal Green book will probably be in 2028. But, I mean, she has so many books in that series, I don’t want to do just one a year, so maybe, we’ll probably work on two a year. For, for shorter series, what we may end up doing, what we’re looking into doing would be, you know, maybe having book one of a series come out, and then you could buy books two and three as an add-on if you want.

Sarah: Mmm –

Julia: With Pennyroyal Green –

Sarah: – that’s cool!

Julia: – it’s a little difficult ‘cause there’s fourteen books.

Sarah: 2027, then, will involve Pennyroyal Green #1 –

Julia: Yeah, The Perils of Pleasure.

Sarah: – The Perils of Pleasure, and then other titles from other authors.

Julia: Yes. And this is where we have to be careful ‘cause I don’t really know what will have been announced by then.

Sarah: Right.

Julia: But I think it is safe to say that there will be a book by somebody whose initials are LK.

Sarah: I was hoping there would be. Just, just, you know –

Julia: Yeah.

Sarah: – I was thinking, well, there’s gotta be at least one, but then you have to tell which one, which, I mean, I know you can’t say. How do you pick which one? ‘Cause they’re, they’re all real good.

Julia: Yeah. Well –

Sarah: And if everyone’s obsessed with say, for example, everyone’s obsessed with Devil in Winter, understandably, but that’s book two of a four-book series. So are you going to drop a special edition of book two and skip book one? Because there are people who will be very – I mean, you can!

Julia: We might!

Sarah: Might! I mean, hell –

Julia: We will!

Sarah: – who the hell knows? It’s, if that is, if that is the –

Julia: Are you listening to what I’m saying to you?

Sarah: Yes, I am.

Julia: Okay, I said –

Sarah: I am!

Julia: – we could, we might, we will.

Sarah: I know! [Laughs] I’m trying to keep it cool here. ‘Cause, I mean, I mean, ultimately I might take, end up taking this section out, but, like –

Julia: Yeah.

Sarah: – that’s so great!

Julia: Yeah. I am also obsessed with Dreaming of You, but that is getting another special edition –

Sarah: I love that book.

Julia: – this year.

Sarah: I love that book.

Julia: I love that book too. And so we, we shifted at the last minute because, yeah; ‘cause, yeah. So yeah, that’s happening.

And then we’re also doing this thing called the Diamond Club, which is a special type thing where you actually get to vote on which books we’re going to do.

Sarah: Well, so if you join the Kickstarter at some levels, then you’ll be part of like an advisory group to help vote on which, which books will be selected in future years. Do you have a year limit in, in mind for how many, like how many years this is going to run, or are you just going to keep doing it as long as you possibly can?

Julia: Do it as long as I possibly can.

Sarah: Hell yeah! We have a few books! I mean, historical romance has a few titles for which you, you could consider! There are many –

Julia: I know!

Sarah: – many options here!

Julia: Yeah! I mean, it was really difficult to figure out what I wanted to do for 2026, and there – well, for 2026, it was interesting: coming up with the lineup for the first three was remarkably easy. Then going to 2027 and picking like six more, that’s when it started getting really hard.

Sarah: …have a hard time making like a Best of 2025 list of the books I’ve read! [Laughs] Come on, that’s hard!

Julia: I know, I know.

Sarah: That’s really hard! I do it all the time. Oh my gosh. And if I, if I ever get, like, asked by a newspaper, Can you write a roundup of these, of books for this topic? And I’m like, You have just asked me for like eight straight hours of work, because I’ve got to make this big old list and then get my axe and start chopping it down! [Laughs]

Julia: Yeah! And so, you know, and we’re also very committed to making sure that we’re not running, you know, the white, cis, heterosexual book club, too.

Sarah: So I wanted to ask you – some of my questions are coming from my podcast audience, my Patreon community, who were very excited about this interview, and Verity wanted me to ask you about your thoughts on how being an author in the romance genre has changed and how you have witnessed this change for the same, roughly the same amount of time that I have. I mean, for example, Eloisa James is now publishing in historical first person, which is like brand-spanky-new. And you have –

Julia: It’s so good. Have you read it?

Sarah: I have not!

Julia: I know –

Sarah: Is it good!

Julia: It is! I think it’s her, I think it might be my favorite book she’s ever written, to be honest.

Sarah: Wow! ‘Cause I know you, you are a big fan of her work. That’s cool!

Julia: I am! I am. I love it! I absolutely love it. You know, and, and I was nervous because I asked – you know, that was, that’s where my being part of the industry really helped JQ Editions out at the beginning when we’re looking and, you know, we, we knew we wanted to try to do some new books as well, and, you know, because I’m in the industry, I knew that this was coming, I knew it was different, I knew it was first person, and I’m also friends with her editor. So I emailed her editor, said, Don’t tell her I asked for this. And her editor knew –

Sarah: [Laughs]

Julia: – the editor knew about JQ Editions because – this is Carrie Feron, who was at Avon for years and years –

Sarah: Oh, I, yes, of course! Yeah.

Julia: …now at Simon & Schuster. And Carrie’s a, just, I, long-time friend of mine. And, and she knows everything about everything in publishing. So I actually had had, I think, gosh, back in March, I had, you know, a Zoom with her asking her advice about all this. So she knew about JQ Editions, she knew what I was looking to do, and so I wrote to her and I said –

Sarah: Perfect person to talk to.

Julia: I…could be – yeah! I was like, I think this could be a perfect first book. You know, I’m looking at the timing and everything, and so can you send me an early copy? And please don’t tell her, because if it doesn’t work out, I really don’t want her to know. You know, and, and Carrie’s involved, and I read it and I was like, Oh, my gosh, thank you! This is so fabulous! I love it so much.

And when you look at the art for this book, you know, Eloisa has, there’s a certain glamour and sparkliness to her writing? And so this author, this artist we’re working with, Shea O’Connor, I’ve been following for a while, ‘cause she did some Bridgerton fan art that I loved. And right as I was trying to figure out what to do, she released these two images of Queen Elizabeth and Mary, Queen of Scots, and I was just like, Oh my gosh, this is perfect for an Eloise James book. And so, you know, she did this portrait of Genevieve with her pet pig, Peony, and it’s so much fun. And she also did, we also commissioned her to do five other portraits. No, I’m sorry, four other portraits of the previous Lady Bs, which are not on the book, but which you can actually, through the Kickstarter, get either as digital downloads or as vellums that you can insert into the book to make –

Sarah: Love it!

Julia: – to give yourself color illustrations, and they’re so much fun.

Sarah: Shea O’Connor is the artist who has a very sort of retro kitsch, sort of ‘50s style with sharp angles –

Julia: She does!

Sarah: – and very, like, like Christmas specials from when I was a kid kind of look.

Julia: I could see that description of it. The end papers she did are amazing, because I wanted the end papers to show not just the main couple; I wanted to have the whole big cast of characters, because there’s such a fun big cast of characters. And so she did them all, and, like, the front is the scene during the day, and then the back is the same scene at night, and they’re –

Sarah: Love it.

Julia: – they’re so awesome. They’re so awesome.

Sarah: This sounds like so much fun, like a lot of work and also a lot of fun.

Julia: Yes. I am quickly learning things like, like, I, I don’t know much about the actual production of books, and –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Julia: – you know, I, I was just like, I’m in over my head! I don’t – ahhh!

Sarah: Yeah.

Julia: But…

Sarah: But the good news is you will really, you really only have to learn it once.

Julia: I hope so!

Sarah: So back to my original question: what are –

Julia: Oh yeah.

Sarah: – some of your thoughts on the changes in the romance genre and how different authors are embracing these, these, you know, this completely new audience for historical?

Julia: You know, I’m, I’m not necessarily the best person to ask, because I now occupy such a unique spot.

Sarah: It’s true!

Julia: My books are backed by a huge television show on Netflix. I –

Sarah: And by Netflix itself, which is no small potato, yes.

Julia: Yeah. So I, you know, and, and – and that’s wonderful. So there are many, many realities of being an author today that I do not have to face.

Sarah: That’s very true.

Julia: And –

Sarah: And you know what? That’s a really fair answer!

Julia: So there are just a lot of things I really can’t speak to, at least not with any authenticity. You know, things that I see – I’m just removed from a lot of that. And I, and I’m extraordinarily fortunate that I am.

Sarah: Yep! I get it!

Julia: So I don’t know, in terms of, like, the author’s experience, I’m not necessarily the best person to ask about the analysis of the market. Same with, you know, people will ask me for advice about how to get a book published, and my first –

Sarah: Ooh!

Julia: – advice is always like –

Sarah: You, you did that like twenty-five years ago!

Julia: Oh, more than that! Like thirty!

Sarah: It’s just like asking me, How do you start a blog? Okay, well, I mean, it’s very easy; everyone can do it; but, like, what are you doing?

Julia: I know. I just said, Look, you know, when I sold my first book, I didn’t even have an email address, so I am, I am not the person to ask! I don’t know how to sell a book today! I don’t know what you have to do to market your first book. I just, these are – you know, I –

Sarah: These are situations you were in more than two decades ago, and the, everything is different. Yes. It’s like somebody –

Julia: Yeah!

Sarah: It’s like somebody who self-published in 2009 or 2010 telling people how to self-publish now. Those, those are two different experiences. I completely understand! That’s a very logical answer.

Julia: Yeah. So, you know, I usually try to tell people, like, you know, Get online, look for resources. You know, and I’ll –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Julia: – I’ll say, like, Look, you know, when I was starting self-publishing was, that was vanity publishing then. It was – and, and now self-publishing – you know, I tell them, like, If you self-published, that was considered a vanity project.

Sarah: Mm-hmm!

Julia: People really pooh-poohed you, and, and now self-publishing, like, these women are, that, I mean, they’re huge blockbuster authors, and they’re doing amazing things, so – because sometimes you’ll get people who say, like, I don’t know about self-publishing; I want, like, a real publisher. I want this. I was like, I would not discount it!

Sarah: Mm-mm! Nope. Especially because –

Julia: You know, so I –

Sarah: – the people who are self-publishing, they’re literally running media companies right now.

Julia: Oh my gosh! I, I, yeah, I, I am in awe.

Sarah: They’re running multimedia companies to self-publish books. It’s incredible.

Julia: Yeah, I, I –

Sarah: I mean, they have a video component and a visual component, art component, sales. They’re running the whole thing themselves.

Julia: I’m pretty good friends with Penny Reid, who lives very close to me in Seattle, and every now and then we get together and she starts talking stuff, and I’m just like, Holy crap!

Sarah: The hell are you talking about? [Laughs]

Julia: What? Oh my God! You know, everything that that woman does! You know, we’ll talk business and, you know, she’ll tell me things, and I was like, I, I don’t, I don’t know anything about that, but –

Sarah: I know all of these words, but the sentence that you just used them in makes no sense to me.

Julia: Yeah! I mean, like she’s producing her own audiobooks. I was just like, How the heck do you do that? Well –

Sarah: Oh yeah.

Julia: – she’s doing it, and, you know, I’ll tell you, audiobooks is apparently where the real money is for these self-published authors. Holy cow!

Sarah: Oh yes. Oh yes. Audio is the grow-, the most growing-est part, I think, of –

Julia: I can see that in my own stuff –

Sarah: Yeah.

Julia: – trust me. But yeah, I mean, but I, I don’t produce them myself, so obviously I’m not taking the lion’s share of everything, and believe me, I’m still doing very well. So I, these, you know, all these self-published authors who are doing their audio books, I’m just in awe of them. They’re incredible.

Sarah: Are you working on anything writing-wise right now, or is, are you focused on –

Julia: I will be soon, and I –

Sarah: Oh, you will be soon? How exciting!

Julia: Yes. And it’s sort of like, you know, when I said I want to try something different, but without really leaving my world? It’s that. And I can’t really say what it is yet.

Sarah: I’m very excited.

Julia: Yeah, I’ll be honest, and, and it, it may completely flop, ‘cause people might be like, What the hell? But, you know, I feel like I’m at a stage where I can kind of do something new because I want to. And, and if, if something doesn’t do as well financially, I’m okay!

Sarah: Mm-hmm!

Julia: You know –

Sarah: Yeah!

Julia: – I, I can still pay my bills, so it’s, I can experiment a little. And, and it’s nice. And I haven’t really done much original in the last five or so years. And it’s been nice! I, I did the Queen Charlotte book.

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Julia: Which was fascinating, ‘cause it’s the only time I’ve ever worked off source material. And it was a lot like doing a puzzle, which I really, really loved. That was super fun.

But other than that, I haven’t had a brand-new book out since 2020, and, and I’m okay with that. I’ve been really enjoying doing some other stuff. I spent a year and a half as the ambassador for EveryLibrary, which is the nation’s only nonprofit geared toward mobilizing voter support for public school and university libraries. And, you know, they started out doing very non-sexy things like helping libraries negotiate bond levies, and I, I don’t even know all the terminology, and recently they’ve had to take a really sharp turn toward fighting book bans…

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Julia: So I spent a year working with them to get the word out about that and to raise money. So for that year and a half, every single library event that I did, I donated my honoraria to them. And I raised really close to about a hundred thousand dollars for them doing that.

Sarah: Yeah! Way to go!

Julia: Yeah. Thank you! And then I used every event as an opportunity to talk about book bannings. Like, I – you know, they, they, they came for the Bridgerton, but they got stuck with listening to me about book bans at first, you know, ‘cause I would open every one saying, I’m just here to tell you that my, my fee for this speaking engagement will be donated to EveryLibrary, and then I would explain about book bans and why they’re such a problem, and the fact that at no time in human history have the people banning books turned out to be the good guys.

Sarah: Nope! Not at all. Nope.

Julia: Never. And, you know, usually we get – nobody ever walked out and left when they heard I was going to do this, ‘cause the people who go to library talks tend not to be interested in banning books, but, you know, a lot of them really didn’t understand the scope of the problem or that things were happening in their communities or how hyper local –

Sarah: Yeah.

Julia: – an issue it is, and so what people need to do – and so I’m speaking to all the smart bitches out there – please, you need to go to your local school board meetings, and you need to go to your library board meetings, because the vast majority of Americans oppose book bans and book challenges in any form. However –

Sarah: And the majority of the book bans are coming from, like, a handful of people. It’s just, like, one person with a stack of forms and a bad hobby.

Julia: It’s true. And, and the way that the laws are written in a number of states, one person can do a lot of damage, but the thing is, is that these people are, they’re loud and they’re dedicated and they show up.

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Julia: So we need to be loud, dedicated, and we need to show up, too, because if the only people showing up at the meeting is somebody who says, I think it is evil and inappropriate for a twelve-year-old girl to read a book where the main character’s best friend has two dads.

Sarah: Mm-hmm. And that’s the only voice you hear, then they have to listen to that one constituent –

Julia: Exactly.

Sarah: – who’s loud, shows up all the time. Oh yeah, showing up is half of the battle.

Julia: Yeah, so that’s, that’s one thing I, I’ve been doing. I’m no longer a –

Sarah: This is not new for you, by the way, because you used to give people epidemiology education during the pandemic, and you were like, Listen, we’re not doing any of this anti-vax bullshit. Let me just explain –

Julia: Yeah.

Sarah: – all this stuff to you. Yeah, this is not a –

Julia: No.

Sarah: – new tread for you, which is –

Julia: No, no.

Sarah: – which is very cool.

Julia: But I do need to point out, because, yes, you should not listen to me because I’m not a doctor. However, I am married to an infectious disease specialist. He is nationally renowned as an expert. And so I am getting…

Sarah: You seem very proud, I just want to say. You seem a little proud. [Laughs]

Julia: I’m extraordinarily proud! And I’m also extraordinarily pissed off –

Sarah: Yes.

Julia: – at the people who are like, Mmm, I’m just going to look online. It’s like, Do you know how many years this man has devoted to saving lives? To keeping up on all the information? You know, and I’ve seen things where somebody says, If you don’t understand these terms – and they’re terms I can’t even remember the name of – it’s like, you shouldn’t be trying to int-, you know, you shouldn’t be doing your own research because you don’t understand the research. You know, there’s a reason he has taken, like, medical statistics courses: it’s so he can understand the research. So anyway, yeah, he’s actually been on leave and is taking a six-month leave, because between the pandemic and RFK Jr., the man’s head was going to explode. I mean, it’s just –

Sarah: It’s so, it’s so wrong! So wrong.

Julia: It’s so awful, so – yeah!

Sarah: It reminds me of talking to, I did two interviews with Jennifer McQuiston, who is a romance author and also was the head of the CDC –

Julia: You don’t have to tell me who Jenny McQuiston is.

Sarah: – division. What was it? Oh, she was in charge of the monkeypox! She, she –

Julia: No, it’s, it’s now called mpox, but yeah. Yes. So Jenny McQuiston actually –

Sarah: Thank you.

Julia: – is my friend, and now she’s Paul’s friend, and I got Paul a speaking engagement at the CDC through Jenny McQuiston, which was, like, such a score. I’m like, Yeah, I got this for you.

Sarah: I am such a fan of Jennifer McQuiston. Like, I know, I think she’s retired at this point? I she might have retired from the CDC. Can’t say that I –

Julia: She has retired from the CDC, yeah.

Sarah: I cannot say that I blame her; I would not wish to be there either. But I’m such a fan of hers? Like, such a fan!

Julia: And she’s a great writer, too!

Sarah: I know! Oh, I completely understand her not writing romance, but I miss it, and –

Julia: Yeah.

Sarah: – she’s fabulous.

Julia: And yeah, and she, I mean, she was out in West Africa during the Ebola outbreak.

Sarah: I, I brought, I had her on the show right after she’d come back, and she was talking about how, like, they wouldn’t eat all day because they were doing these, these, these experiments out into uninhabited areas to try to find where infections originated.

Julia: Yeah. Well, anyway, so I will just say right now, you can’t trust the CDC right now for vaccine information –

Sarah: I know.

Julia: – but you can trust the American Academy of Pediatrics –

Sarah: Yes.

Julia: – or the Infectious Diseases Society of America, which are both using evidence-based research, which is not what the CDC is using now. And I’ll also give a little plug: my husband has a podcast.

Sarah: Really?

Julia: He does. It’s called Germ & Worm. It’s a travel health podcast.

Sarah: [Laughs] Germ & Worm!

Julia: Germ & Worm. He –

Sarah: I love it!

Julia: – he is Germ, not Worm.

Sarah: Huh.

Julia: I don’t know why I feel compelled to point that out, but he is Germ. Yeah, and it’s all your travel health questions answered. They, and they have, like, they’ve, they’ve been putting it out like once a week forever. I’m like, Honey, you could slow down; you don’t have to do that much. And their, their slogan is, It’s a, it’s a big world. See it in good health.

Sarah: I love this so much. I will make sure –

Julia: Yeah.

Sarah: – link to that in the show notes.

Julia: Yeah, do it. Germ & Worm.

Sarah: May I ask you about Bridgerton, the upcoming season? I have some questions.

Julia: Yeah, you sure can! I think –

Sarah: Okay, so the –

Julia: – the first four episodes will have aired by the time this is going.

Sarah: Yes, they are, they are coming soon!

Julia: Yeah.

Sarah: So with the upcoming season of Bridgerton, Alanna asked me to ask, to ask you:

>> I know in a previous episode, Julia said she’d spent time on the set of Bridgerton in the first season. Have you been able to do that for subsequent seasons, and, and are there any plans for season four?

Julia: Yes! So I’ve been able to go at least once each season, and I need to tell readers and viewers, I get no choice about really what I see. That is all, I’m not allowed to go when the sets are closed, so I’m not there for any intimate scenes. And that is as it should be. But –

Sarah: Fair! Absolutely fair; entirely appropriate, yes.

Julia: Yeah. It’s really just, like, when I visit. So, like, you know, for season two, there are some people who are still upset that I, I wasn’t able to visit when John, Johnny and Simone were there. But I was like, Look, I, I don’t get to pick! This is the day I was there.

Sarah: I wouldn’t be able to breathe if I was looking at Jonathan Bailey and Simone Ashley.

Julia: Well, okay –

Sarah: I would, I would be – like, my inner thirteen-year-old would just melt down. [Laughs]

Julia: I know. I mean, I have met them both. Simone, I’ve met now twice at premieres, and oh my gosh, that woman – she’s so beautiful! She is, I don’t understand how she walks on those legs? They’re, like, so long.

Sarah: Spoken like a short lady. I can, I can relate.

Julia: I, I am five foot two on a tall day. Yeah, Simone –

Sarah: And I’m five-three; I hear you. And Simone is, like, up, twice of us.

Julia: I know, it’s crazy. I mean, she’s, she’s so beautiful.

And Jon-, Jonathan I met a few more times just ‘cause I, I met him on the season one, ‘cause I –

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

Julia: – I actually did that more in season one, and I got to meet him then. You know, and that was before it was a big deal. And then I, I took my niece to London in April and we went to see him in Richard II, and I managed to get backstage passes to see him, and so we got to meet him afterwards. I am Aunt of the Year forever. I mean, I thought she was going to pass out. This is a theater kid, so she’s just like – gasps –

Sarah: She must have been dividing inside. Just, oh my gosh.

Julia: Oh, she was, yeah, yeah. Oh my gosh.

I have been able to go every year, at least once. I, I visited the set for two days for season four, and I saw, they were working on episode seven and eight then. So the stuff that I saw get filmed, you know, won’t be out till the end of February. And, but it was, one of the scenes was really just magical. It was, without giving away what it is, it was a scene that has, like, pretty much the whole family there.

Sarah: Right, which –

Julia: And the –

Sarah: – are the best scenes. I mean –

Julia: They are the best, and they’re absolutely magical, and it was so delightful and really, really special.

And then, you know, and I’ve seen rough cuts of everything. And it’s always really fun when I see the rough cut of a scene that I saw getting filmed.

There’s another one I saw getting filmed with Violet and Daphne and all the daughters –

Sarah: Yeah.

Julia: – like episode one. It’s just, it’s really fun when you see the scenes that you –

Sarah: Have you seen the Bridgerton Fireplace on Netflix?

Julia: [Laughs] I have, yes.

Sarah: Okay, I did not realize that there were multiple Netflix fire-, fireplaces. There’s a Bridgerton one, there’s a Witcher one, and there’s a third one I can’t remember off the top of my head, but I was like, there’s a Bridgerton fire-?

Julia: …Stranger Things one!

Sarah: I’m sorry, the what?

Julia: Stanger Things, I think, has one.

Sarah: Yes, thank you, that’s it! It was a Stranger Things fireplace. For, like, the holidays, instead of the Yule log, it’s the Bridgerton fireplace? So I was like, This is cool. I opened it up – [laughs] – it’s actually gorgeous!

Julia: Oh yeah.

Sarah: What did you think when you saw that? Like, of course there’s a Bridgerton fireplace. You go to Target and it’s like, Oh look, Dove Bridgerton. ‘Kay?

Julia: I haven’t seen those in person. And, and honestly, you know, I don’t always find out about the merch ahead of time.

Sarah: No, absolutely not. I mean, authors don’t find out when their own books are on sale. Like, you finding out about merch –

Julia: Yeah.

Sarah: – is just way too much to ask. [Laughs]

Julia: So, so some merch, some merch I do; some merch I don’t. And, and you know, and so it’s very funny. So I actually found out about Jeni’s ice cream in Bridgerton. Do know Jeni’s ice cream?

Sarah: I certainly do!

Julia: I love Jeni’s ice cream, and I mean, and I live in Pacific Northwest where it’s not very easy to get, at least not my favorite flavor, which is pineapple upside down cake, which is so good that, I mean, I have to it mailed to me on dry ice. And so I’m on their mailing list, and I get this email in my non-professional email account, and it’s just like Jeni’s plus Bridgerton! And that’s how I found out about it.

And, and so most of the merch things I have no contact with, but there have been a few that I do have contact with, and I am pleased to say that Jeni’s is one of them and they’re sending me all the ice cream, and they’re even sending ice cream to, like, my family members, which I’m so excited about. And, and then they’re like, Do you have any events that we could provide ice cream for? So I am doing a signing – Oh! This is going to air right after it! Well, hopefully my event that I just did in New York City will have had Jeni’s ice cream at it.

Sarah: Yay!

Julia: Yay, and then we’re –

Sarah: Are you doing a launch event in New York City?

Julia: No, you know, we’re just doing one because I’m coming in to do The Today Show again where I recommend books.

Sarah: Fabulous!

Julia: Yes, and –

Sarah: That’s a question I’m going to ask you, so good. [Laughs]

Julia: I, well, I’m just like, you know –

Sarah: What’s a book? The same thing –

Julia: What’s a book?

Sarah: – happens to me. If someone asks me, Hey, do you have a book, you have any book recommendations? My whole brain just goes blue screen –

Julia: I know; it’s so hard.

Sarah: – and I’m like, What is a book? That’s a thing?

Julia: Yes.

Sarah: Yeah.

Julia: And the thing is, recommending them for The Today Show is actually harder than you would think, you know?

Sarah: Very hard, very hard.

Julia: Well, the reason being is that it has to be a book, not just a book you really like, but one you’re willing to, like, like on national television. And two – this is the harder part – they generally want the books to be new books, but they’re talking to you several months in advance. So I have to go out and source books that haven’t come out yet. And nobody’s, like, sourcing them for me. I have to go out – so that’s why I finally got a NetGalley sub-, the subscription, so I can go out and ask for things. And, and, just so you know, I still do get rejected on NetGalley.

Sarah: I get rejected all the time. I watch people get upset about it, and I’m like, Happens to me all the time; it’s okay. You know, it’s a, that, that’s a publicist at three in the morning; just leave him alone.

Julia: Can I just tell you, can I just tell you, I have been rejected more than once for Christina Lauren books? It’s like, you know, I could see like, you know, maybe, like, rejecting me for, like, the new John Irving? Although they gave it to me, so I was very pleased about that. But I was like, you know, Christina Lauren is romance. I, I have some reach in romance? So it was – anyway, it’s kind of funny. I think I told, I can’t remember which one I told about that, and they were like, Oh my God. And I keep getting rejected by Avon Books UK, and they keep saying like, You don’t have enough feedback, ‘cause I don’t give, I don’t give feedback… And so I get that, but I feel like saying, like, you know, I am, I am actually, you know. And I have in my bio, you know –

Sarah: I’m Julia fucking Quinn! [Laughs]

Julia: No, I don’t have that. But I do say –

Sarah: My I suggest you try? [laughs]

Julia: – author of the Bridgerton series. And, you know, I recommend books on social media and also occasionally on national television shows. So. [Laughs]

And, you know, the last time I went on, I recommended this incredible book called Sweetness in the Skin by Ishi Robinson, which is so wonderful. And I found it because I was just, like, nosing around on NetGalley. So, you know, and, and that’s not a romance.

But I, I hate being the romance author who only recommends non-romance books?

Sarah: This is a problem –

Julia: So –

Sarah: – I sometimes face too.

Julia: So I would also like to tell people some other books I have read recently that are coming out soon or have recently come out that I loved. And The Crowd Went Wild by Susan Elizabeth Phillips.

Sarah: Really!

Julia: I also loved And Now, Back to You by B. K. Borison.

Sarah: I have that on my list to read!

Julia: It’s really, really good. And then The Paris Match by Kate Clayborn: loved. Now these are all, these are all contemporary. Oh! You know what’s coming out? It’s a, I call it cozy historical romantasy, which is The Antiquarian’s Object of Desire by India Holton.

Sarah: Yep!

Julia: And that one –

Sarah: Yep.

Julia: – is magical! And that whole series is fabulous. I love that one so much. And then other historical romances – the thing is, the historical romances I’ve been reading are often not new.

Sarah: Mm-hmm. Well, I mean, you are doing a subscription box of vintage titles, so that does make sense.

Julia: Exactly. So the, that’s –

Sarah: [Laughs]

Julia: …stuff I have to find. I did just read for the first time, A Lady Awakened by Cecilia –

Sarah: Grant.

Julia: – Grant, which I really liked a lot. And it, I mean, it was just so different than any other historical romance I’ve ever met. It was, you know – and it’s definitely very different from my style. So don’t go reading it thinking you’re going to get something like J. Q. But I really –

Sarah: No.

Julia: – liked it a lot.

Sarah: I love that book because it takes the basic premise of sex as a progressive form of intimacy and removes the progress, because they start going to Bone Town on the regular at the very beginning of the book for plot reasons that make total sense –

Julia: Yeah.

Sarah: – if you read the book –

Julia: Yeah.

Sarah: – but they don’t know each other, and they don’t really like each other, and they are committed to just going to Bone Town, and so the sex is not intimate for them? What becomes intimate is, like, discussions about sheep herding and all of this –

Julia: Yeah!

Sarah: – like, land management stuff, and I’m like, Oh my God, nerds; I love it.

Julia: I would like to point out that the term “going to Bone Town” is not included in the book.

Sarah: No, of course not!

[Laughter]

Sarah: In a, in a historical, Julia, it’s Ye Olde Bone Towne. That’s how you say it in a historical! Gosh!

Julia: So I just read that one; I really liked it.

Oh, you know what else I’m reading and loving –

Sarah: Tell me!

Julia: – is Christina Dodd’s Daughter of Verona series [Daughter of Montague].

Sarah: Really!

Julia: Yes! Now, this series is basically, she took the idea of, like, what if Romeo and Juliet hadn’t died?

Sarah: Interesting!

Julia: So they got married and they had this big family, and now – it’s a first-person series from their eldest daughter Rosaline, or Rosie, as everybody calls her, and it’s really funny, and it is wildly anachronistic in places, but she leans into it. Like, I, I’m okay with the anachronism as long as you’re just like, you know, that’s part of the whole thing; like, she’s not doing it by accident. And it is so good, and the hero is so good, and it is so funny, and you know, I’ve talked to Christina about this, and I’m like, I do not understand why this works.

Sarah: [Laughs]

Julia: There’s no earthly reason why this series should work so well. And I was like, But I don’t think – ‘cause I’m going to give it a cover endorsement, and I don’t – but I’m like, I can’t put that on the book. Can you imagine, like, from Julia Quinn: There’s no earthly reason why this book should work. But I’m telling you here, since I can give you, like, the whole thing: it really does! And it’s so funny and entertaining and subversive. And, and it just, it just does! It just absolutely does. It’s really, really funny. So yeah, and, and that’s a series that’s best to read in order.

Sarah: Oh yes. I –

Julia: Yeah.

Sarah: – I can understand why that is so.

Julia: So the first one I think is, it’s just called Daughter of Verona, I think [A Daughter of Fair Verona]. The one I just read is coming out later; it’s called Teach the Torches to Burn. And they have these –

Sarah: Damn!

Julia: – awesome covers. Yeah.

Sarah: Damn.

Julia: We, we might be looking at that for, like, JQ Editions, but not till 2028 when we finally have room.

Sarah: Oh my goodness!

Julia: I know.

Sarah: [Laughs] So far in advance!

Julia: So far in advance. But, you know, but that’s ‘cause we filled up the 2027 slots, and you know, we’re only doing six in 2027. And, you know, there’s so many great books, so if it does really well, then maybe we’ll move to monthly in 2028. I don’t know. But I don’t –

Sarah: That’s very cool.

Julia: – I don’t want it, like, to suddenly make it too expensive for people. So maybe we’ll do it monthly, but I don’t know how, like – anyway. Okay, all right!

Sarah: Where can people find you if you wish to be found?

Julia: If I wish to be found, yes, you can find me on social media. I’m on Facebook and Instagram, and I’m, I like to think I’m delightful on social media. Although, you know, I occasionally will do things like, I did recently read the preamble – actually, I recited the Preamble of the Constitution on the anniversary of January 6th. It was very interesting: somebody on Facebook accused me of peddling liberal crap.

Sarah: [Laughs] I’m sorry! Oh my god!

Julia: I know. So that was like, I think that was maybe the only thing I replied to, and I was like, Since when is the Constitution liberal crap? And they did delete. I went, I was going back trying to find that to show someone, and they had deleted it, so maybe I actually got through to them. I mean, not that – I’m not going to change their mind about liberal versus conservative, but maybe just the fact that the Constitution is neither.

So yeah, but for the most part, I’m super delightful. And then we also have JQ Editions on, that’s Facebook, Instagram as well, but it’s also on TikTok. Although I –

Sarah: Oh-ho-ho-ho!

Julia: Well, I have nothing to with the TikTok account; we have a, a person who runs that.

Sarah: Good!

Julia: But you know, I do want to say I run my own social media. So if you follow me –

Sarah: That’s interesting.

Julia: – on Facebook or Instagram, you’re getting the genuine, real, honest-to-God to meet me. And you know what? I don’t have an assistant, either.

Sarah: Wait, what?

Julia: I don’t have a personal assistant. I don’t, I don’t even know what I would do with a personal assistant!

Sarah: Dude, I used to be a former, I was a former executive assistant to CEOs. I could tell you like nine things you could do with a personal assistant right off the top of my head. [Laughs]

Julia: Okay, well, that’s a conversation for another time. But yes, if you –

Sarah: Just email me later. I’ll be like, Here’s what I used to do, and here’s all the time that you will now have.

Julia: Anyway, yes, you can find me on those social medias, and I promise you are getting actually me. That is not somebody doing it. I do that…

Sarah: That’s very cool!

Julia: And I do because I actually enjoy it! And so, and that’s why –

Sarah: Yeah!

Julia: – I’m on those two platforms, because I actually enjoy those two platforms. Like, I’m not, I’m, I’m not – well, Twitter is nixed, but I wasn’t on Twitter because I didn’t enjoy Twitter. I tried it once, I felt very inauthentic, and I got rid of it. You know, I’m not –

Sarah: Probably a very wise choice in the long run. [Laughs]

Julia: Yeah, I, I, I was ahead of the, everybody else by fifteen years. You know, I’m not on TikTok because I just, I, I, I –

Sarah: That is not my native language.

Julia: It’s not my native language, I’d be so cringe, and so – to use TikTok language. So, you know, I’m sticking with what I actually enjoy, and I think if I enjoy it, it’ll come through. One of the things I love doing on Instagram is fan art.

Sarah: Yup!

Julia: So I’ve got –

Sarah: Isn’t it cool?

Julia: – a lot of fun fan art there, and, yeah, so there’s mostly different things.

[outro]

Sarah: And that brings us to the end of this week’s episode. Thank you especially to Julia Quinn for taking time out of her day to talk to me. I also want to thank Verity, Sue, and Alanna for the questions. And I want to thank you for listening, because I wouldn’t have a show if you weren’t listening to it, so thank you.

 I will have links to all of the books that we discussed, but in the event that you didn’t quite catch the announcement, two of the 2027 books include Julie Anne Long’s A Season for Scandal and Lisa Kleypas’s Devil in Winter. I am very excited to see the fan reaction to both of those. You can find everything that you need to know about JQ Editions at jqeditions.com.

As always, I end with a terrible joke; I would never leave you hanging. This joke comes from LissyVee. It’s really bad! That’s why I’m sharing it.

Why did the bald man draw rabbits on his head?

Give up? Why did the bald man draw rabbits on his head?

From a distance, they look like hares.

[Boom-tish, laughs] I love it just imagining you guys going, Ugghhh!

Coming up next week, Amanda and I are back with Romantic Times Rewind. We are going to be talking about a 1997 issue – dun-dun-duh! – so be ready for that.

On behalf of everyone here, we wish you the very best of reading. Have a wonderful weekend, and we will see you back here next week. And in the words of my favorite retired podcast Friendshipping, thank you for listening; you’re welcome for talking!

[end of music]