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Welcome to New Faces, where you can meet debut romance authors and find out about their books! This time we're visiting with Lisa Valdez, whose first historical romance is Passion from Berkley Sensation. Lisa, welcome to TRR! Tell us about yourself. I grew up in the West Los Angeles area, where I still live. I attended UCLA and earned my degree in English Literature. I'm married to my high school sweetheart and have two beautiful children. Are you coming to romance writing from another job? I started writing when I was still working as a buyer for Nordstrom. But I didn't write in earnest until I left Nordstrom after the birth of my first child. I have photographs of my daughter, as a baby, sleeping over my shoulder while I type at the computer. What led you to write romance? I started reading romance when I was thirteen. SHANNA, by Kathleen E. Woodiwiss was my first (I still have it). Later, I discovered Judith McNaught and Lisa Kleypas. I read Julie Garwood and Amanda Quick. Much later, I really enjoyed Diana Gabaldon's OUTLANDER and DRAGONFLY IN AMBER. I have also always been a huge fan of historical fiction. I love Sharon Kay Penman and Margaret George, especially. And finally, I adore the classics - Dickens, Melville, and Hardy; DeFoe, Thackery and Trollope. Oh, and I can't leave out Shakespeare, Chaucer and the marvelous early tales that make up the bulk of Arthurian legend. All these wonderful story-tellers, and so many more I haven't mentioned, led me to want to write. But I write romance because I believe deeply in romance. I believe in undying love, love at first sight and "to love and to cherish." I believe in honor, heroism and happy endings. I believe in good and evil, and God and country. And, since I write sensual romance, I believe in the miraculous beauty and transformational power of sex. As I began writing, I wanted to write romances for those of us for whom avid sex and romantic love walk hand-in-hand. I could find romance without explicit sex and I could find explicit sex without romance, but I could rarely find the two together. So, I decided I wanted to write romances where the sex got more passionate as the love grew, not less - where the sex was as raw, yet beautiful, as the emotions and needs of the characters. And, most importantly, I wanted the framework of a traditional romance (i.e. one man, one woman, monogamous relationship, plenty of internal and external conflict, blossoming love, and happily ever after). Lastly, a word about historicals - which will always be my first love. I write them because, for me, there is nothing like traveling back to another place and time - a slower time; a time when no phones rang, no horns honked and no one dreamed of coming down to dinner improperly dressed. There is something about this slower paced and more formal life that I really enjoy in a romance. Not that this cannot be attained in a contemporary, it's just that a historical setting automatically takes me into that slow, romantic mindset. Tell us about your road to publication. I think my road to publication was fairly direct. I started out by joining my local chapter of Romance Writers of America. There, I found out everything I could about the craft of writing. I was writing my first book at the time, a medieval that I adore and will sell at some point in the future. It was at a chapter meeting that I, quite by chance, hooked up with my critique partner, who helped me to make my writing even stronger. So, with my completed manuscript ready for submission, I attended my first RWA National conference and my first local chapter conference. At National, I attended all the spotlights put on by the various publishing houses. But it was actually at my local chapter conference that I first met Cindy Hwang (Berkley Publishing Group). She immediately caught my eye. She was smart, experienced and she didn't like trends (which told me she wouldn't be closed to a rule-breaker, like me). She also seemed to have a strong intuitive sense and a broad view in terms of what she liked. And, perhaps most importantly to me, I had an intuitive sense about her - I thought this woman will "get" me. At that point, I decided that she was the editor I wanted and, while I did submit on a couple of occasions to other editors, she was the one I really began to court. By that I mean that I signed up to pitch to her, I attended where she spoke or was part of a panel, and I entered contests that she was judging. And, in fact, she bought PASSION from a contest. What kind of research was involved for your first book? For PASSION, I did quite a lot of research on the Crystal Palace. It was an amazing building - built on an incredible scale, altogether over 772,000 square feet (over 19 acres) not including the over 200,000 square feet of galleries. Over six million people attended the exhibition! A few readers have found it rather unrealistic that Mark and Passion could have sex behind a screen (mind you, it was a huge cathedral scale screen) without being noticed. But it's important to understand that this wasn't like visiting your local museum on a quiet day. The incredible ebb and flow of people - the sheer numbers of people, all talking and walking in a glass and steel building made for a very loud place. It truly was a spectacle - meant to impress, overwhelm and, of course, symbolize the superiority of Victoria's Great Britain. I also had to research "deep penetration" sex. I found out all sorts of things I didn't know, like that the uterus can move, and that the vagina can "tent" or balloon with intense arousal to house a large penis. I discovered that there are all sorts of nerve endings high in the vagina and that it is, in fact, possible for many women to achieve full penetration and intense orgasm with their extra-large partners. The key is arousal. Who knew?! Who are your influences as a writer? I think I addressed this above. But a few others would be Anne Rice, Madeline Hunter, Susan Johnson and early Linda Howard. What does your family think of having a published romance author in their midst? My immediate family is very proud and supportive. Tell us about plans for future books. PATIENCE and PRIMROSE are scheduled for release June, 2006 and January, 2007. After that, I intend to write CHARLOTTE. Her story will be the last of The Passion Quartet. Then I'm planning on a Georgian romance, entitled THE RED RIBBON, which will be a stand alone book featuring an icy heroine by the name of Olivia Winterton, a charming and devil-may-care hero, James Markham, and a villainess, Marie de L'Amboise, whom I adore. How can readers get in touch with you? I'm at novelsbylh@yahoo.com . Lisa, thank you for joining us and best of luck with your future books! Readers, we have a review of Passion here at The Romance Reader.
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