Today's Special - - Christie Kelley

It's our pleasure to welcome back historical romance author, Romance Bandit and Dish favorite, Christie Kelley!  Christie is celebrating the October 5th release of the fourth book in her Spinster Club series, Scandal of the Season.  It's the story fans of the series have been waiting for and features the unlikely pairing of "bad boy", Anthony Westfield, Viscount Somerton with shy and quiet Victoria Seaton.  But, as you can see from Christie's blog there's much more to these two characters than what their surface images would have you believe. 



Merry Christmas, dishes!

Oh, wait, it’s only October. Well, let’s start the holiday season early. When I heard that my editor wanted me to write a Christmas book with an October release date, I thought he was crazy. I never realized that many October books have holiday themes. The original book that the editor slated for October was my April release, Something Scandalous. Now that would have been an easy book to add in some Christmas. In the story, my hero brings seven of his younger siblings over from Canada so with all those children around during the holiday season would have been simple!

Instead, they moved Something Scandalous to April and Scandal of the Season became the Christmas themed book. Hmm, my darkest hero now is in a Christmas book! Okay, my heroine does take in orphans so I suppose that might help. Of course, the orphans are all from the “ladies” in the brothel next door. And quite honestly, I always imagined my hero and heroine away from the orphans during most of the story.

Another complication to this was the time period. During the Regency, Christmas wasn’t celebrated as in Victorian times, which is where we get many of our current customs. Christmas was much more solemn. While Christmas trees weren’t completely unheard of, it was not an accepted Christmas custom. And if they were used at all, it was just a small tree that fit on a table. Basically, it was off to church in the morning followed by a large meal and maybe a gift or two exchanged.

So now what do I do? I can’t tell my editor no to adding Christmas to the story.

I worked around the situation.

I had my heroine, Victoria love December because people are more generous to the orphans and less likely to be angry if she happens to pinch a little change from them. (Did I mention she’s a pickpocket?) While my hero, Somerton despises December, and Christmas because of several bad things that happened to him during that month in the past. Then I decided to have a secondary character invite my hero out to a country party in December. The host loves Christmas and wants everyone to be in a Christmas mood. I was able to add a tree but have my hero and heroine talk about how strange that is and discuss how it will never become an accepted custom. There also was a belief that it was bad luck to bring evergreen cuttings into the house before Christmas Eve. So little by little, I was able to add enough Christmas into the story to satisfy my editor.


I guess it all worked out.

So what do you think about holiday themed books? Do you love them and rush out to get them as soon as they’re released? Or do you dislike them? 

Thank you so much for having me today! This is one of my favorite sites!

We love having you visit with us, Christie!  For more information about Christie, please visit her website or friend her at facebook.  And be sure to check out the Contest tab at Christie's website.  She's holding a new website contest every week during the month of October!