This morning we welcome Jan Scarbrough to That Book Place for an Interview.

That Book Place:  Did you always want to be an author?

Jan Scarbrough: My dreams of being a writer started in the ninth grade thanks to a very special English teacher. That year I actually reported on freelance writing for my career project. However, I didn’t seriously pursue my dreams until after a life threatening illness in 1988. After that, I figured there was no time like the present to get started!

TBP: What made you decide to write in the Romance field?

JS: As a teenager, I devoured novels by Thomas B. Costain. I also read and loved Anya Seton and Georgette Heyer. In the 70’s, romance was changed by books like The Flame and the Flower and Sweet Savage Love. I picked romance because that’s what I liked to read.

TBP: Can you tell us who your favorite author is and what your favorite book is?

JS: My favorite book is Katherine by Anya Seton. I’ve also just discovered Philippa Gregory and her first person books about historical figures. I recently finished The White Queen and am waiting for The Red Queen, who was in real life, the descendent of Katherine in Anya Seton’s book.

TBP: Do you have any interesting experiences that have happened to you?

JS: Life is stranger than fiction. Someday I’ll write a contemporary version of what happened to me twenty years ago. I’ve already fictionalized it quite a bit in my contemporary Gothic, Tangled Memories.

TBP: What is your favorite thing that has happened to you as a writer?

JS: Two things: meeting all the other wonderful people who are crazy enough to want to write fiction and becoming a finalist in

the Romance Writers of America’s Golden Heart Contest.

TBP: Where do you get your inspiration for your novels from?

JS: My family. Things that have happened to me.

TBP: Do you do a lot of research for your novels?

JS: The most research I’ve ever done for a novel is for my medieval My Lord Raven. I have hundreds of medieval history bo

oks. For the contemporaries, I research as needed. Last year’s Ladies of Legend novella, A Groovy Christmas was set in 1968. Although I lived through that time, I had to refresh my memory. The Internet contains of wealth of information and makes research easy.

TBP: What can we expect in the near future from you?

JS: Last Christmas I had a novella called A Groovy Christmas which was part of the Three Decades of Love Christmas

Anthology. It took was set in Legend, Tennessee, a town my writing pals and I made up. This year’s Christmas novella will be released September 8 and is called Not Quite Christmas. It is set in 1969 and follows up where A Groovy Christmas left off.

Blurb

Christmas 1969

Accountant Frank Smith doesn’t want to go home for Christmas, not since he was dumped by his long-time girlfriend on Christmas Day a year ago. Avoiding Legend, Tennessee,
is high on his priority list until he meets his mother’s houseguest—hippie chick Emmy Johnson, a girl with a past . . . . and maybe Frank’s future.

After that I have a book out from a new small press—Turquoise Morning Press—called A Father at Last. After that, who knows?

Here is a short bio on Jan:

A professional technical writer by day, Jan Scarbrough spends her nights writing romance. She is a member of Novelist, Inc., the Romance Writers of America, and the Kentucky Romance Writers, where she manages their award-winning web site. Jan has written for Kensington and ImaJinn Books, and currently has contracts with The Wild Rose Press and Resplendence Publishing. She is the mother of two grown children and two stepchildren. She lives in Louisville, Kentucky, and rides American Saddlebred horses for fun and recreation.

You can Find Jan online at:

http://www.janscarbrough.com/

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Jan-Scarbrough/204815941631?ref=nf

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