Author spotlight and giveaway. Q&A with Anna Jacobs.

The RWA blog welcomes the wonderful Anna Jacobs, author of 47 published novels. Anna freely confesses to an addiction to storytelling. Fortunately, she is not very domesticated, so has plenty of time to produce 3 novels a year, writing sagas for one publisher, modern women’s fiction for another. She is fascinated by women’s history, not rich women, but working women, and also by the challenges women face in today’s changing world. Her books have been nominated several times for Australian Romantic Book of the Year, which she won in 2006, and she is currently the eighth most borrowed author of adult fiction in English libraries. She’s still in love with her own personal hero, and they live half the year in Australia, half in England.

Q: You have a new novel out, Freedom’s Land. What’s it about?

It’s a historical saga, set against the background of group settlement in Western Australia in 1924-5, a fascinating part of local history. Norah’s husband was killed in the Great War, and she’s struggling to provide a home for her daughter. Andrew’s wife is dead and he wants to make a new life for his two sons. The Australian government is giving married ex-servicemen a farm, as long as they clear the land themselves. Will a marriage of convenience give Andrew and Norah the chance they seek for a better life in far-away Australia? Can two strangers be happy together?

Q: Tell us a bit about how long you’ve been writing for, how did you get started and how did you get that first call?

I’ve been writing since I learned to hold a pen and started writing stories for my teachers. I first got published in French textbooks, when I was a teacher. Then I started writing novels – as well as working full-time and raising a family – as you do!  <g>  In 1991 I won a $10,000 prize for a regency romance in a big Australian writing competition, which included publication. I was phoned at work and burst into tears – then had to cover the phone to explain to my colleagues in the office that I was sobbing from happiness not sadness. After my editor verbally accepted another book from me, management changed at the publisher and they rejected it.

It was good in the long run, because the book was more suitable for the English market. I sent it to an agent and in 1992 he sold it to the first publisher he submitted to – Hodder & Stoughton UK – and I’m still with them, still writing historical sagas.

I also got a fantasy novel accepted in the same year, and had five SF/F novels published as Shannah Jay.

Then my historical novels took off and I concentrated on them, but later I started writing modern family/relationships novels for another publisher – always with a romance at the heart – and I’m still with Severn House.

My 47th novel has just been published – ‘In Focus’. When a new feature on Pete Newbury’s popular TV programme shows his adult image digitally transformed to that of a young child, Beth is shocked to realise he’s her ‘baby’ brother, who vanished without trace 38 years ago. Her mother, who has never recovered from the loss, desperately needs closure, but Pete makes it very clear he doesn’t want to know his birth family. To further complicate matters, Beth has fallen in love with Edward, Pete’s cousin and manager.

Q: How do you go about working on a manuscript, what’s your style of writing?

I write alternate modern and historical novels, which keeps me fresh. I collect ideas all the time, have dozens stashed away. and it’s a question of which idea tempts me at the time. Sometimes a story won’t wait its turn but will nag me and invade my dreams.

I don’t plot in advance but I do research carefully and think about my story. I write the first two or three chapters slowly, rewriting many times, then when all the plots and sub-plots are set up I somehow know it’s time to go and I write about 2-3,000 words a day till it’s finished.

I write as quickly as I can to stay inside the story, and call the first version the ‘dirty draft’. After that comes my favourite part of writing – polishing. And I don’t mean tiddling with words, I mean polishing the story most of all. One polish may be all it needs. If I write at a bad time eg during my mother’s final illness, I may need to polish two or three times. No story leaves home till it’s as perfect as I can make it. I never rush them into the post!

I don’t write sexy or gruesome or weird stories. I find real people fascinating enough without that. But I do like complex plots, with 2 or 3 or even more sub-plots. And of course there has to be a happy ending.

Q: What’s the next project you’re working on, and how many other manuscripts do you have in the pipeline?

I’m currently finishing Book 3 in a series set in Western Australia in the 1860s, based on a real incident, where 60 starving cotton lasses (Lancashire mills had closed for lack of cotton during the American Civil War) were brought to WA to act as maidservants. I added four more imaginary lasses to the group. Book 1 ‘Farewell to Lancashire’ was published in hardback in July in the UK, and is coming out in a special Aussie edition in trade paperback in January with a gorgeous cover, then in mass market paperback in July 2010. Book 2 ‘Beyond the Sunset’ is in the pipeline and comes out in hardback in July 2010. Book 3 is three-quarters finished in ‘dirty draft’ form.

I have a couple of other books in preparation – not sure when they’ll be out. I have to finish the current historical then write a modern novel that is contracted before the end of March. Bit of a tight deadline because I squeezed in an extra book while I was in the UK.

I haven’t a clue which story idea I’ll focus on for the modern novel. It depends how I feel when I’ve finished this series. And after that I’ll be writing a sequel to ‘Freedom’s Land’ my own favourite among the books I’ve written.

Q: How long did it take you to write Freedom’s Land and what was your daily routine?

It took me three months only – historicals usually take four months but this one wrote itself, burning white hot out of my mind, filling my dreams with scenes, pouring out on to the computer screen like lava. I was so lit up by the history of the period and by this story!

Every day I get up at 5am, give or take half an hour, not out of virtue but because my body wakes at dawn, wherever I am. I do my emails first because the English business ones come in during the night usually. Then I have breakfast and get my shower. After that I play cards on the computer for about 20 minutes. It relaxes me and I write best when relaxed.

I write about 1,000 words in the morning, and write some more in the afternoon, between 2-3,000 all up, rarely more. But this is every day! Later in the afternoon the first English business emails start coming in, so I have to answer them. I also do other jobs then, eg answer reader emails – I get an average of two a day, increasing steadily. Or do PR jobs, like this interview!

When a book in preparation needs editing or proofreading, I stop writing and do whatever is needed, for 3 or 4 days. Working steadily at something keeps a better focus than butterflying from one thing to another. There are always things queuing up to be done eg this week, I’ve given two library talks. I needed to prepare them, pack up boxes of ‘show and tell’ stuff, and then do the talks. That nibbles into my writing time, but it’s good PR, library readers and staff are usually delightful and it makes a refreshing change.

One of the most important other jobs is communicating with my agent. I have a new one, because my other lovely agent died. The new one and I are still settling down together so we maybe talk more than we would usually. But then we’re both communicative people. She’s great! As I write three novels a year at least, I keep her busy!

SPECIAL NEWS:

In January the special Australian edition of ‘Farewell to Lancashire’ will be for sale in bookshops, KMart and BigW. So don’t miss out.

Anna Jacobs is offering a signed copy of ‘Freedom’s Land’ to people in Australia or unsigned if you’re from overseas. Make a comment and we will pick a winner…Good luck!

And the winner of ‘Freedom’s Land’ is KANDY SHEPHERD. Congratulations Kandy! Please email your details to blogmistress@romanceaustralia.com so that we can arrange your prize to be sent.

for more information about Anna, visit her website.