Loretta Chase



Dear friends, Spring is slow to come in New England, but eventually the flowers do start blooming and birds begin chirping with a proper enthusiasm. And spring is the time when this author emerges from her hermit cave to meet readers here and there. Please check the APPEARANCES section below for updates of personal appearances as well as my cybertour connected to the release of YOUR SCANDALOUS WAYS on 27 May. In between all this unusual activity, I’ll be working on a new book, of course. This time the setting is London Regards, Loretta

BOOK NEWS This year sees two book releases. In addition to YOUR SCANDALOUS WAYS, Avon will reissue THE LAST HELLION in November 2008 with a handsome new cover. For more about YOUR SCANDALOUS WAYS, you might... Visit my new YouTube channel. Wander around my Avon microsite. Check out the feature at Romance B(u)y the Book during the week of 19 May. Stop by the Word Wenches blog. On 28 and 30 May Wench Holloway Scott interviews me. A lucky commenter will win an autographed copy of the book. Click on these links to my Word Wenches posts dealing with YOUR SCANDALOUS WAYS: What the gondolas of Lord Byron's time were like. A peek at the palaces in which James & Francesca live. Some thoughts on fallen women. Francesca's fabulous jewelry. An early preview of YSW. You can also join my cybertour (see below, under APPEARANCES). Miscellaneous Tidbits... At Dear Author, which has recently given YOUR SCANDALOUS WAYS a lovely review, you can also find the riveting story of my first sale.
OTHER NEWS & MISCELLANY I continue to blog at Word Wenches, with six other authors on rotation, Mon-Wed-Fri. My turn comes about every two weeks or so. Look for the photo of a member of my Barbie® collection at the top of the post. At Word Wenches, you can sign up for Feedblitz, which will send the blogs right to your e-mailbox. You may also want to sign up for the Word Wenches Newsletter, to keep you up to date with all seven authors. Another way to keep up with the doings of Wenches and a few other authors is to stop by Book And Author News. You can find still more at my Avon website
GENERAL BOASTFULNESS YOUR SCANDALOUS WAYS has received some very good reviews at: LIBRARY JOURNAL The Publishers Weekly blog and the Dear Author review mentioned under Miscellaneous Tidbits above.
BOOKS ABROAD The first three books of the Carsington brothers series--Miss Wonderful, Mr. Impossible, and Lord Perfect--will be appearing in French editions from publisher J’ail Lu. The Russian version of Lord of Scoundrels will come out courtesy of Ast publishers. In Italy, publisher Mondadori will be bringing out the first of the Carsington books, Miss Wonderful, this summer. For more in connection with my Italian releases, please stop by Isn’t It Romantic?. Much of the material at this site is in both Italian and English, so fear not, ye who, like me, are not multi-lingual (although I’m working on it, having recently begun Italian lessons). LARGE PRINT AND E-BOOKS The following are all available as e-books From Avon: Lord of Scoundrels, The Last Hellion, Not Quite A Lady, and Three Weddings and a Kiss. From Berkley: Miss Wonderful, Mr. Impossible, and Lord Perfect. BOOKS COMING & GOING As noted above, THE LAST HELLION returns to print in late fall, following up LORD OF SCOUNDRELS’ very successful reissue in December 2007. However, other of my older books remain out of print. Some readers have asked about how to obtain unused editions of the Regencies as well as the original (1994), editions of Captives Of The Night. This can be done without much difficulty. Please send your request to author@lorettachase.com and include the book title(s) in the subject line. For more on these and my other books, please turn to the BOOKLIST page.
NEWSLETTERS and ANNOUNCEMENTS To receive my e-newsletter, which appears two or three or four times a year, please sign up here. If you’d like to receive a post card announcement when my new books come out, please email your name & address to author@LorettaChase.com and type “Add to mailing list” in the subject line.
*AUTOGRAPHED BOOKMARKS & COVER FLATS* If you’d like a signed bookmark or a signed cover flat of YOUR SCANDALOUS WAYS, all you need to do is send a stamped, self-addressed envelope. For details--size of envelope, postage, mailing address, etc., please email me at author@LorettaChase.com and type “Bookmark” or “Cover flat” in the subject line.

In Person Nothing currently scheduled...please check back later. In Cyberspace My author cybertour, connected to the release of Your Scandalous Ways, begins 21 May at ROMANCE B(U)Y THE BOOK. 27 May ROMANCE NOVEL TV 27-28 I pay a cybervisit to Italy, at Isn’t It Romantic to chat with Anna (who helped me get the Italian right for YOUR SCANDALOUS WAYS) and her friends. Note: This blog is bilingual. 29 May you’ll find me at the VAUXHALL VIXENS blog 28 & 30 May, a two-part interview about YOUR SCANDALOUS WAYS at WORD WENCHES. 9 June Romance bandits As always, you are most welcome to email me at author@LorettaChase.com with questions, comments, etc. Please put something specific in the subject line, like a book title or “Question about _________” or such, to reduce the likelihood of your message being mistaken for spam (a great deal makes its way to this address, unfortunately) and deleted.

If your question isn’t answered here or elsewhere on the website, please send it to author@LorettaChase.com. Q. What is the fifth Carsington book? When can we expect to read Geoffrey Carsington’s story? Will you write a story about Peregrine and Olivia of LORD PERFECT? Will you write a story about Colonel Morrell of NOT QUITE A LADY? A. These questions are all related, since they deal with the continuation of the Carsington brothers series. The short answer is, neither my new 2008 nor 2009 releases continue this series. However, there may be another Carsington book eventually. Q. In what order should the Carsington brothers series be read? A. Though I try to write each book to stand alone, here’s the order of publication: MISS WONDERFUL (March 2004) MR. IMPOSSIBLE (March 2005) LORD PERFECT (March 2006) NOT QUITE A LADY (May 2007) Q. LORD OF SCOUNDRELS is part of your first series of historical romances. In what order should these books be read? A. Here’s the order in which they were written and originally published: THE LION'S DAUGHTER CAPTIVES OF THE NIGHT LORD OF SCOUNDRELS "THE MAD EARL'S BRIDE" (novella) in the THREE WEDDINGS AND A KISS anthology THE LAST HELLION Again, though I try to write so that each story can stand alone, it probably makes the most sense to read the first two together, and the last three together, these being the most closely related. People can get confused because the stories don’t follow a neat chronological order. Events in CAPTIVES take place before (1818), during (1828), and after (1829) the events of LORD OF SCOUNDRELS. CAPTIVES is the story of the Comte d'Esmond, whom one meets briefly in LOS. The major part of his story takes place in 1829, some time after LOS. THE LION'S DAUGHTER and CAPTIVES OF THE NIGHT, which were out of print for several years, were released in fresh formats as Berkley Sensation Spotlights in January and May of 2006. "THE MAD EARL'S BRIDE, " a novella in the THREE WEDDINGS AND A KISS anthology, has had a very long life. The anthology has never been out of print and is available not only in a great number of languages but in several formats, including e-books. LORD OF SCOUNDRELS and THE LAST HELLION will be reissued in fresh formats at a future date. At present, LOS is still in print and readily available in the original format. Q. When will your next book be out? A. Spring. I am trying very hard to have a new book out every year about the same time. Q. Where do you get your ideas? A. It’s a mystery to me. Often, not until after I’ve written a book do I realize where the story came from. A lot of fragments from various sources--books, newspapers, movies, TV, dreams, overheard conversations, magazines, friends, and family--combine in the brain and via some strange alchemy are transformed into a single fictional world. Q. What is your writing routine? A. It’s usually five days a week, but hours are variable because Life intrudes. On the best days, it doesn’t, and I can put in a solid six to eight hours. It’s not all pounding the keyboard. There’s a good deal of staring-into-space as well as looking-things-up and deleting-everything-written-yesterday. I like the research better than the writing and the writing better than actually working for a living. Q. What is the most difficult part of writing? A. The first part. Sitting down in front of the computer every morning and getting started, moving from the real world into the story’s world. The story’s world is an Unknown, on many levels, and sometimes it’s like walking out of a sunlit room into a dark cellar. You don’t know what you’ll find down there and you’re not sure you’ll be able to handle it when you find it. Q. How much time do you spend researching a book? A. Before hitting the keyboard, I usually spend a few weeks haunting the bowels of the libraries as well as trying to purchase books that will be in frequent use. Some stories demand more research time than others. Those set in locales outside England, for instance, tend to eat up more research time. Research is an ongoing part of my writing process: fact checking, for instance, the layout of a house or room, the distance between places, the best mode of travel, the travel times, the clothes people are putting on or taking off, etc. Q. What led you to set books in Albania? A. It’s my ethnic heritage. It’s where my parents were born and many of my relatives live. My first attempt was in the first part of THE ENGLISH WITCH, a traditional Regency. CAPTIVES OF THE NIGHT may be the only historical romance whose hero is Albanian, and THE LION’S DAUGHTER the only one whose heroine is half Albanian. Q. Will character A from book B ever get his or her own story? A. This question has been asked about Jason in THE LION’S DAUGHTER, the Marquess of Arden in THE ENGLISH WITCH, Lord Berne in THE DEVIL’S DELILAH, and some others. The answer is, Probably not. If they didn’t fire up my imagination for a story back then, the chances are slim that they will now or in the future. Q. Are you going to write traditional Regencies that are officially single-title Regency historicals, or are you going to write more in the tone of LORD OF SCOUNDRELS (considered a full-blown Historical Romance)? A. Until I got this question, I never thought about the difference. So it’s not a conscious decision. I let the characters determine the tone of the story and the readers decide whether it’s more historical or more Regency. Q. Do you ever travel to speak to RWA chapters and, if so, what are your requirements? A. Because I write so slowly, it’s crucial to limit other activities, no matter how much fun they are--like attending RWA chapter conferences. Two a year is the limit for this indulgence. Since preparing a talk takes weeks, I’ve only done it three or four times in my whole career.