Rowena Cherry - Knight's Fork | Insufficient Mating Material | Forced Mate | Mating Net - Racy, Wildly Entertaining Futuristic Romance

RC: Jennifer, Thank you for agreeing to be a part of my November/December newsletter.

JD: Thanks for inviting me.

RC: I think the first book of yours that intrigued me was RAVEN'S HEART. Was it your first? How many books have you published?

JD: Yes, RAVEN'S HEART was my first, in 1998. It's just been revised, expanded, and re-released as FUGITIVE LOVERS, from Cerridwen Press. I've had over a dozen books published -- I'm not quite sure how to count them, since there are two reissues that are significantly rewritten. So it's either 14 or 16. Plus I have contracts for another novel and another anthology that are in the works.

RAVEN'S HEART (re-released as FUGITIVE LOVERS)
DARK SALVATION
SHADOW PRINCE (re-released under the same name)
HEAVEN & HELL (anth.)
STARDATES (anth. - out of print)
SHIFTERS (anth.)
SEX MAGIC
TIED WITH A BOW (anth.)
LUCK OF THE IRISH (anth.)
PARTY FAVORS (anth.)
R.S.V.P. (anth.)
HOT SPELL (anth. -- released in print as SEASONS OF MAGICK)
NOT QUITE CAMELOT
SINGLE WHITE SUBMISSIVE (anth.)

RC: You've always been generous to the writing community, especially as editor of SFR (http://www.specromonline.com), and since then with your workshops for various RWA chapters . What have you done lately?

JD: Well, the biggest effort was being the conference chair for our chapter's yearly conference in September, which pretty much consumed me after I got back from speaking at the RWA National conference in July. We went from a half-day of presentations by local authors to a two-day conference headlined by two NY Times bestsellers, appointments with two editors and two agents, and twin tracks of workshops for writers at all levels of experience. It was a fabulous success, but a lot of work. A friend and I were last-minute substitutions for a speaker who had to cancel the morning of the conference, and we ended up recreating our presentation on our blogs (http://www.livejournal.com/users/jennifer_dunne/tag/technique). Then in October, I taught a month-long online workshop for the Carolina Romance Writers called "Party Hot Hot Hot" about upping the heat level in your writing, and a week-long online workshop for Sally's Paranormal Workshop about manifesting your desires, and was a guest of the Ohio Fiction Writers annual conference.

RC: In your experience, is "giving back" good for career building and visibility, or is it intrinsically worthwhile in and of itself?

JD: I think it's similar to people who donate time to charity -- the people they're helping can tell the difference between someone who is there to prove they're virtuous, and someone who is there from a sincere desire to help others. So "giving back" has done wonders for building a career network and raising my visibility, but if I'd been doing it for that reason, it wouldn't have. I've always enjoyed teaching, even while I was still in school myself. Knowledge is like love -- it grows when you share it.

RC: In your SFR editorials you shared powerful and fascinating views about heroes, alien characters, and worldbuilding. Have any of your opinions changed? If so, please share. If not, please tell us some of your great loves or pet peeves.

JD: I'm a classic Gemini. My opinions probably changed in the length of time it took me to write the articles. :-) But my greatest love, as you can guess from the six years I spent at the helm of SFR, is cross-genre fiction. I love a nice, juicy romance crossed with a deep, thoughtful fantasy. I'm thrilled by all the cross-genre books that have come out lately, and the lines devoted to them, like Harlequin's Luna, Tor's Paranormal Romance, and Berkley's Sensation, as well as the 2776 series from Leisure's LoveSpell. And I have all of the Silhouette Bombshells, which are great action/adventure-romance crosses, some of which are also fantasy/sf.

RC: What attracted you to Ellora's Cave?

JD: Initially, the money. MaryJanice Davidson told me how well her books were doing there, and I had a manuscript (SEX MAGIC) that was too sexy and/or too wildly paranormal for the publishers I'd submitted it to, so I figured I had nothing to lose by sending it their way. I stay there, not just because of the money (although that's still very attractive), but because of the incredibly supportive, nurturing atmosphere.

The authors are free to try anything. NOT QUITE CAMELOT started out as a bonus short story, to include with the reissue of SHADOW PRINCE, and ended up as a novel by the time I was done with it. I kept emailing my editor with the progress, and asking if the new length (as I went from short story, to quickie, to novella, to novel) was going to be a problem. She told me to just write the story, and they'd figure out how to publish it when I was done. I can't imagine having that kind of flexibility at one of the big publishing houses.

RC: I love your title Single White Submissive. It sounds such a witty twist on the movie Single White Female. Is there a story behind the story on this?

JD: This is the fourth BDSM-themed anthology by Dominique Adair (JC Wilder), Madeleine Oh (Rosemary Laurey), and me. Each one has a unifying theme, in addition to the BDSM aspect. TIED WITH A BOW had each heroine receiving a gift. The characters met at parties in PARTY FAVORS.

For R.S.V.P. each heroine received an invitation. So we were tossing around ideas, and I mentioned the extremely explicit personal ads I'd seen in an alternative lifestyle newspaper down in Miami (which I'd researched for my story in R.S.V.P.). We all thought that was an idea we could have fun with. Rosemary suggested starting each story with a copy of the personal ad. And we were off to the races. My novella in the anthology actually ended up being an homage to Broadway musicals, probably because I'd just finished performing in a community theatre production before I wrote it.

RC: What are your planned public appearances, workshops or booksignings? Will you be at the Daytona Romantic Times Conference?

JD: I'm still setting up my calendar for 2006, but currently I'm planning on attending Book Expo America in Washington, DC, while RT is going on down in Daytona. I'll also be at Boskone in Boston in February. Some of the other conferences I'll be visiting are (tentatively) Balticon (Baltimore) and Albacon (Albany). These are all fantasy/sf conferences, because those are the readers I need to reach, since I'll have three fantasy/sf novels coming out in print next year.

RC: I understand Not Quite Camelot will be coming out in print in January. Are you able to give us a sneak peek?

JD: Sure.

EXCERPT FROM NOT QUITE CAMELOT, by Jennifer Dunne

Angie stared at the warm hand she held in hers, tracing the tiny scars and picturing the hilt of the sword that had toughened the skin in such an interesting pattern. She looked around the room again, noticing the intricate carving on the chairs and detailed stitching of the wall hangings, then glanced out the window to the garden where rose bushes bloomed profusely in every shade of pink, white and gold. It was real.

She fought back an urge to start screaming, terrified that once she began, she'd never stop. It was insane. Impossible. She must be dreaming. And yet she couldn't argue with the truth of her senses. She was not sleeping in the back of the car. She was here.

And here, wherever it was, was not safe. The mysterious Gervaise seemed to have summoned her here for some nefarious purpose, although fortunately she hadn't arrived where he'd expected. She'd read enough tales of the Round Table to recognize Gervaise as an evil sorcerer, perhaps a male Morgan LeFey. Although by Reynart's recent confession, he'd then be Mordred, the king's bastard, and that didn't sound at all right. He acted more like Lancelot, rescuing Guinevere. That's how she'd think of him, as her Lancelot, even though he looked more like Richard Grieco, with the same intensity and dangerous attitude. But just like Booker on _21 Jump Street_, he'd only be dangerous to the bad guys.

Her fingers tightened around Reynart's, her anchor of chivalrous stability in this confusing world. "If you're going to hide me, we should probably go as soon as possible."

Just as he had the first time she clasped his hand, he stared at her fingers wrapped around his with a look of wonder, as if it was beyond imagination that someone would hold his hand. He'd caught both her hands and held them when he sought the promise about not bad-mouthing the royal family, but that wasn't the same. His grip had been more of a method of focusing her attention forward, on him, for her promise. The way she held his hand now was a gesture of trust and an offer of friendship.

Some remembered pain darkened his green eyes and he deftly slid his hand from her grasp, refusing her offer. "Follow me. Stay quiet."

Angie hiked up her skirts and followed him into the hallway. Even in boots, he walked without making a sound. She tried to step as softly as she could, walking on her toes, although the thin leather slippers on her feet did nothing to protect her from the hard stone floor. She winced silently, certain that the balls of her feet would never forgive her.

They reached the intersection where she'd first appeared and turned down one of the side corridors. It dead-ended in a flight of stairs. Reynart went first, beckoning her upward when he reached the landing and could see that the way ahead was clear.

He waited for her at the top of the stairs, leaning down to whisper in her ear as she drew level with him. "Stay here. I need to see how many guards are in the hall."

His whisper had been barely louder than a breath and she knew she could never answer as quietly. So she simply nodded.

He shot her a brilliant smile that left her so stunned, she never saw him disappear down the hall. Good Lord, the Prince was gorgeous! She'd known he was good-looking, of course, even though his black hair was spiky with sweat and his face and clothes were covered with a fine layer of dirt. He moved with an innate grace and the sense of tightly leashed power. But all the time he had been speaking to her, his expression had been focused and contained, making it clear that, while Reynart might be helping her, he did so for his own reasons and those reasons had nothing to do with liking her or caring for her. That smile, however, lit up his eyes so that they looked like faceted emeralds sparkling in the sun and transformed the sharp edges of his cheeks and jaw into a prism that reflected the jewels' light. It made her believe that anything could be possible. That he might not just be _a_ Prince, he might be _her_ Prince.

* * * * *

Reynart strode down the corridor toward his rooms, surreptitiously angling his body to hide his wounded arm as he pretended to adjust his belt. Only one guard, at the end of the hall by the King's rooms. A formality, indicating none of the members of the royal family were in their chambers. Unfortunately, the guard was not one that he trusted.

He frowned as he opened the door to his chambers, automatically reaching inside the partially opened door to disable the crossbow trap before it fired a bolt at his heart. Alaric had run from their practice bout after wounding him. He expected his brother to have returned to his rooms.

A year ago, he could have said why his brother ran, and where he'd gone. He didn't think Alaric would carry tales of their forbidden duel to the Queen, or Heavenly Pair forbid, the King. Their relationship had changed since the summer wars, but not by that much. Still, it bothered him, one more symptom of the gulf yawning between them.

Reynart hurried through the sitting room to the bedroom beyond. Pulling off his shirt, he winced as the fabric stuck to his wound ripped free. He tossed the shirt into the basket of mending that was beginning to grow to alarming proportions, then wet a cloth from the ewer by his bed and cleaned the wound. As he'd thought, it was little deeper than a scratch and needed no other treatment. A second pass of the cloth wiped the dirt of the practice field from his face and hair.

He selected another shirt from his armoire, a blue as close to the color of Anjeli's dress as he could find, pulled it over his head and left his chambers without resetting the trap. He and Anjeli would need to get into the room as quickly as possible. Or at least, she would—he'd need to time his approach carefully so that the guard saw him, but only him, opening the door and entering the room.

His initial plan, to simply inform the guard that he was taking a woman into his chambers, would not work. Not with the guards on the lookout for a missing woman, and a guard of dubious loyalty watching the hall. He'd have to fall back on his secondary plan, sneaking in when the chambermaid came to light the fires in the royal suites. The guard's primary purpose was to protect the King's chamber. He'd have to supervise the chambermaid when she was in there. That would give Reynart and Anjeli approximately half a minute to get from the stairwell to his door.

He walked slowly down the corridor, as if his whole purpose in returning to his chambers had been merely to clean up after sword practice. He turned the corner into the stairwell and found Anjeli pressed up against the near wall, the last place someone would look as they came around the landing. It wasn't much of a hiding place—the castle had been designed to create the minimum number of hiding places possible—but it showed a surprising amount of intelligence given the nonsense she'd been speaking earlier.

As always when things surprised him, his suspicions rose. She was obviously clever. Clever enough to pretend not to know who he was? Was she perhaps working with Gervaise, in some plot to discredit him? He knew the mage favored Alaric over him, since Alaric indulged the mage's base desires, while Reynart found the mage repulsive. Of course, given the man's magical prowess, perhaps it was for the best that he allowed himself to be so easily distracted by serving girls and chambermaids. If he ever managed to remain completely focused on his magic, he would be truly dangerous.

In fact, the girl before him looked remarkably like Gervaise's preferred type, except for being a member of the nobility. She was young, slender and athletic, with a modest cleavage showed to full advantage by her tightly laced bodice. And after all, the only reason he assumed she was a member of the nobility was her appearance. Her manners were nothing like those of the young women of the court. She was quite possibly nothing more than someone's servant dressed up as a noblewoman.

However, as Gervaise would certainly know, he could not afford to take that chance. He would see her to safety first. Then he would find out who she was and what she was doing here. And this time, he would have the truth.

If she was truly innocent of who and what he was, he would kill anyone who tried to harm her. But if she was only pretending innocence, he would kill her himself.

RC: Finally, is there anything I have not asked that you would like your readers to know?

JD: There's been some confusion by readers about the Cerridwen Press books, and what it means that they were released under that imprint rather than the Ellora's Cave name. (Cerridwen Press, for those not aware of it, is the mainstream imprint of Ellora's Cave.) It does NOT mean that there is no sex in the books. My novels were originally sold to Ellora's Cave, and they're sexy enough to be released as EC titles. What it means is that the romance, while crucial to the story, is not necessarily the focus of the book. NOT QUITE CAMELOT and SHADOW PRINCE are fantasy novels (although NQC is shelved as Fantasy Romance and SP is shelved as Fantasy) with the romance between Angie and Reynart running through both books, and FUGITIVE LOVERS is a Futuristic Romance.

Because the fantasy and sf elements are so strong, we felt that the books would be better served by being released under the Cerridwen Press banner, leaving my erotic contemporary romances under the Ellora's Cave banner. A lot of authors take different pseudonyms to indicate what genre their books are in. Since I'm writing under the same name, splitting them over the two different imprints helps set reader expectations for genre.

New from Ellora's Cave - Single White Submissive

New from Cerridwen Press - Not Quite Camelot, Shadow Prince, and Fugitive Lovers

Excerpts and info at www.jenniferdunne.com - Jennifer Dunne

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