Author Interview: Jenna Jaxon

 

Please welcome author Jenna Jaxon who is promoting her book, Only Scandal Will Do. She shared a few thoughts with us!

Author: Jenna Jaxon

Publisher: Lyrical Press

Date of publication: July 2012

He has the woman of his dreams, but what price will he have to pay to win her heart?

Kidnapped and sold at auction in a London brothel, Lady Katarina Fitzwilliam squelches an undeniable attraction to the masked stranger who purchased her, pits her wits against him, and escapes him and the scandal that would ruin her life.

Unable to resist temptation in a London brothel, Duncan Ferrers, Marquess of Dalbury, purchases a fiery beauty. She claims she's a lady, but how can she be?

Kari: What inspired you to become a writer?

Jenna: Writing has always been something that I enjoyed.  I wrote my first story in 3rd grade--about a woman who finds a kitten.  Write what you know, right?  We were always adopting kittens and cats at our house.  In 8th grade we were given writing prompt about a brother and sister who discovered a time machine.  I went crazy with it, wrote a Civil War era story that was a pretty decent length.  Got a 100% on it and kind of knew then I was a writer, because I enjoyed writing so much.

Three and a half years ago, January of 2009, I read Kathleen Woodiwiss’s final book, Everlasting.  It was set in my favorite period--medieval--and when I finished it, I looked at the computer in my office and said, “I can write something like that.”  And sat down and started to draft the outline for Time Enough to Love.  I haven’t stopped since.

Kari: Where do you come up with the idea for your books?

Jenna: Everywhere. Only Scandal Will Do was due partly an historical incident--the last peer hanged in England--and partly a scene in another historical that I took a completely different way. My erotic novella Hog Wild was supposed to be an erotic fractured fairy tale--my daughter suggested The Three Little Pigs, my husband rides Harleys so I immediately thought about HOGs, and it took off from there.  My current book I’m in edits with, 7 Days of Seduction, was inspired by Katy Perry’s song “Last Friday Night.”  But the ideas just run rampant.  Everything is a potential idea for a story.  I was visiting an old friend, glanced at him, and thought, “Well, he’d be an unlikely hero,” (because he fits no romance hero stereotype) and I now have an outline for “An Unlikely Hero” sitting on my computer. If only my fingers can keep up with the ideas!

Kari: What exciting projects are waiting in the wings?

Jenna: Well, I’ve been a busy little bee this summer. As I said, I’m finishing up edits for 7 Days of Seduction, I’ve got a Victorian historical novel, As Long As You’re Mine, out to three agents, I’ve just sent Betrothal, Book 1 of my medieval trilogy, Time Enough to Love--my first novel, if you remember--to my editor and I plan to self-publish that this fall (followed swiftly by Betrayal and Beleaguered).  And I’m starting work on revisions of the second book in the House of Pleasure series, the one that follows Scandal, Only Marriage Will Do.

Kari:  Who is your favorite literary character and why?

Jenna: The one who immediately pops into my head is Scarlett O’Hara from Gone With the Wind. She was the first heroine I’d read who took her destiny into her own hands.  Right or wrong, she was determined that she would be the captain of her own fate and I admire her for that.  Women haven’t always been taught that that’s acceptable, and to have her example when I was growing up helped shape my views of what women could and could not do.

Kari:  Just for fun, if you could be any animal, what would it be and why?

Jenna: I love the whimsy of this question!  I think perhaps a meerkat.  I watched the show, Meerkat Manor, several years ago and was fascinated by the community these animals build out in the Kalahari Desert. It was my favorite show while it aired, an animal style soap opera that kept me on the edge of my seat. They were all very personable and I’d love to join the Whiskers group. LOL

Thank you Jenna!!

About the author:

Jenna Jaxon is a multi-published author of historical  and contemporary romance.  She is currently finishing revisions to  her third full length novel, As Long As You’re Mine, set in Victorian London and Richmond, Virginia.  Her Georgian novel, Only Scandal Will Do, the first in what she hopes will be a series of five interconnecting novels, will be released in May 2012.

Jenna has been reading and writing historical romance since she was a teenager.  A romantic herself, she has always loved a dark side to the genre, a twist, suspense, a surprise.  She tries to incorporate all of these elements into her own stories. She lives in Virginia with her family and a small menagerie of pets.  When not reading or writing, she indulges her passion for the theatre, working with local theatres as a director.  She often feels she is directing her characters on their own private stage. 

She has equated her writing to an addiction to chocolate because once she starts she just can’t stop.