Contemporary Authors

• An Extraordinary Union ( first volume of "The Loyal League" series) Kensington Books (New York, NY), 2017
• A Hope Divided ( second volume of "The Loyal League" series) Kensington Books (New York, NY), 2017

1. An extraordinary union LCCN 2017296868 Type of material Book Personal name Cole, Alyssa, author. Main title An extraordinary union / Alyssa Cole. Published/Produced New York, NY : Kensington Books, [2017] ©2017 Description 258 pages ; 21 cm ISBN 9781496707444 (pbk.) 1496707443 (pbk.) CALL NUMBER PS3603.O427 E97 2017b Copy 1 Request in Jefferson or Adams Building Reading Rooms 2. A hope divided LCCN 2017285762 Type of material Book Personal name Cole, Alyssa, author. Main title A hope divided / Alyssa Cole. Edition First Kensington trade paperback edition. Published/Produced New York, NY : Kensington Books, 2017. Description 266 pages ; 21 cm ISBN 9781496707468 (paperback) 149670746X (paperback) CALL NUMBER PS3603.O427 H67 2017 Copy 1 Request in Jefferson or Adams Building Reading Rooms

• A Duke by Default - 2018 Avon, New York, NY
• A Princess in Theory - 2018 Avon, New York, NY
• Let Us Dream - 2017 CreateSpace,
• Agnes Moor's Wild Knight - 2016 CreateSpace,
• Be Not Afraid - 2016 CreateSpace,
• Let It Shine - 2016 CreateSpace,
• Radio Silence - 2015 CreateSpace,
• Mixed Signals - 2015 CreateSpace,
• Signal Boost - 2015 CreateSpace,
• Eagle's Heart - 2014 Loose ID,
• Sweet to the Taste - 2014 Wild Rose Press, Adams Basin, NY

• Alyssa Cole Interview - https://alyssacole.com/about/

  About
  SO_Headshot_005

  Alyssa Cole is an award-winning author of historical, contemporary, and SFF romance. Her Civil War-set espionage romance AN EXTRAORDINARY UNION is the winner of the American Library Association’s RUSA Best Romance for 2018. She’s contributed to publications including Shondaland, The Toast, Vulture, RT Book Reviews, and Heroes and Heartbreakers, and her books have received critical acclaim from The New York Times, Library Journal, Kirkus, Booklist, Jezebel, Vulture, Book Riot, Entertainment Weekly, and various other outlets. When she’s not working, she can often be found watching anime with her husband or wrangling their menagerie of animals.

  She is represnted by Lucienne Diver at The Knight Agency.

  To learn about new releases, sign up for Alyssa’s newsletter here. If you would like to contact Alyssa, feel free to email using the form below!

• Amazon - https://www.amazon.com/Alyssa-Cole/e/B00I0EK99U/ref=dp_byline_cont_book_1

  Alyssa Cole is an award-winning author of historical, contemporary, and SFF romance. Her Civil War-set espionage romance AN EXTRAORDINARY UNION is the winner of the American Library Association's RUSA Best Romance for 2018. She's contributed to publications including Shondaland, The Toast, Vulture, RT Book Reviews, and Heroes and Heartbreakers, and her books have received critical acclaim from The New York Times, Library Journal, Kirkus, Booklist, Jezebel, Vulture, Book Riot, Entertainment Weekly, and various other outlets. When she’s not working, she can often be found watching anime with her husband or wrangling their menagerie of animals.

• Romantic Times - https://www.rtbookreviews.com/author/alyssa-cole

  ALYSSA COLE
  2017 – Rt Book Of The Year winner
  2017 – Historical Romance winner
  2015 – Futuristic Romance winner

• BookPage - https://bookpage.com/interviews/21188-alyssa-cole#.Wv3zNEiUs2w

  Web Exclusive – April 01, 2017

  ALYSSA COLE
  Love under fire
  BookPage interview by Savanna Walker

  Two Union spies fall in love during a dangerous mission to thwart the Confederacy in our Romance Top Pick for April, An Extraordinary Union. Author Alyssa Cole has written a number of historical romances in other eras, but had determined to never set a novel in the Civil War. She talked to us about what made her change her mind, what it's like to switch between writing historical and contemporary romance and more!

  Describe your latest novel in one sentence.
  A freed black woman with a photographic memory goes undercover as a slave in a Confederate senator’s home, where she meets a rakish fellow Union spy who grates her nerves, aides her cause and steals her heart. TL;DR version: Nevertheless, she persisted.

  Because Elle has an eidetic memory, she frequently quotes or remembers passages from books she’s read. How did you pick out these quotations and determine which authors would be Elle’s favorites? Is there any overlap between what she enjoys and literature you like?
  Although I do enjoy some of the literature Elle references, I looked through books that would have been available and/or popular during her lifetime, and searched for passages I thought would have resonated with the character. Because she remembers everything, there was a lot of material to work with!

  You write in so many genres! Do you find there’s a difference in how you write depending on which genre you’re working in?
  I think the biggest difference is, of course, the vocabulary and setting of the book, which I try to fit to the era in which the book is set. Sometimes when I’m bouncing between contemporary and historical, I’ll realize my contemporary characters are speaking like my historical characters, and then I have to recalibrate. I think no matter the subgenre, I try to focus on characters I find compelling and the romance that drives their stories.

  You’ve written several other historical romances but had determined to not write a book set in the Civil War. What changed your mind?
  Actually, and I had totally forgotten this, but An Extraordinary Union was the first historical romance I ever completed! I’ve always been a history buff and loved historical romance, but I had been resisting writing historicals<< because I didn’t want to deal with all of the horrible aspects of America’s past>> (this is a very typical American trait, you may have noticed). But I became a regular reader of Ta-Nehisi Coates’ blog at The Atlantic and fell in love with American history—particularly the untold stories.

  In mid-2013, I had the idea to pull together an anthology of Revolutionary War romances featuring Americans whose stories are often neglected in history books, which eventually became For Love and Liberty (and my novella Be Not Afraid). I also wrote the first two chapters of a story that would eventually become my Civil Rights activist romance, Let It Shine. But I was definitely not going to set anything in the Civil War period . . . and then NaNoWriMo 2013 rolled around. The month before, I saw a call for a historical novella and 1960s America, the setting of Let It Shine, was beyond the cut-off point. Then I remembered Mary Bowser, the Civil War spy who Elle is based on, and “Definitely no Civil War” seemed a bit too hasty. Elle and Malcolm’s story took off from there.

  Elle is an incredible heroine. What do you admire most about her?
  I admire her bravery. One of the things that struck me the most in the accounts I read of Black-American Civil War spies was the bravery it must have taken to risk everything for a country that had done so wrong by them. Espionage and the situations it entails are harrowing, but I think it takes a special kind of bravery to believe fiercely in a country that has given you every reason not to.

  Elle and Malcolm are both based on real historical figures. Where did you first hear about them and what about these people inspired you?
  I’m pretty sure I first heard about Mary Bowser on Coates’ blog. I believe I came across Timothy Webster, who meshed well with the idea I already had for Malcolm, while researching Pinkertons. While Elle and Malcolm are fictional, the inspiration I drew from Mary and Timothy was their bravery, ingenuity and dedication to the American ideal.

  You split your time between the Caribbean and NYC, and love to travel. What is your favorite place you’ve discovered recently?
  Lately, because I live in the Caribbean for the most part, I’ve actually discovered some new places in America while visiting family and attending conventions. My most recent place that I really enjoyed was San Diego, which was warm and lovely. My impression of the city was probably aided by the fact that I rented an amazing tiny house while I was there!

  What’s next for you?
  Right now I’m finishing up Book 2 of The Loyal League series, A Hope Divided, which follows Malcolm’s brother Ewan. I’m also working on the second book of my Reluctant Royals series with Avon, which is launching in 2018. I’m really excited about this series, which is fun contemporary romance. And I’m also shining up my novella for Hamilton’s Battalion, an anthology I’m working on with Rose Lerner and Courtney Milan that will be out later this year.

• Happy Ever After - https://happyeverafter.usatoday.com/2017/12/13/madeline-hunter-alyssa-cole-interview-a-hope-divided/

  Romance Unlaced: Interview with Alyssa Cole, author of 'A Hope Divided'
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  By: Madeline Hunter | December 13, 2017 12:00 am

  Alyssa Cole’s first historical romance, An Extraordinary Union, was published to critical acclaim and lots of buzz. Her new one, A Hope Divided, is being received with the same enthusiasm. In addition to sharp writing and deep characterization, her books do what the best historical romances do — provide a heartwarming romance alongside insights into history with which readers may not be familiar.

  Alyssa Cole (Photo: Katana Photography)

  Alyssa agreed to answer some questions for HEA readers.

  Madeline: Please tell us about your new book.

  Alyssa: A Hope Divided is book two of The Loyal League series, which follows various agents of a group of freed and enslaved black people and their allies as they try to help the North win the war. In this book, the heroine, Marlie, is the daughter of a former slave and a white father. Her mother is a root doctor, using herbal medicine to heal. Marlie went to live with her father’s side of the family as a teenager, though she never met him, and now she’s incorporated science into the traditional medicine she learned growing up. Her family are Unionists, and they help the Cause by bringing food and Marlie’s medicine to the Union prisoners of war at a nearby prison camp. Marlie is also smuggling information out to the Loyal League. There she meets Ewan McCall, who eventually escapes and is sheltered in her attic laboratory. But when danger arrives on Marlie’s doorstep and invades her home, she and Ewan are forced to flee into the wilderness, where guerrilla warfare wages between the Home Guard and those Southerners who resist being drafted to fight for the Confederacy.

  Madeline: You have two unique characters at the center of this book. Can you share how you came to give them their special qualities, strengths and challenges? In particular, what inspired you to write a hero like Ewan?

  Alyssa: Well, I enjoy when characters have specific characteristics that push them together and pull them apart, and both Marlie and Ewan are intensely curious, but Marlie is very empathic, while Ewan tries to use logic to guide him, while forgetting that he is moved by emotion, too. Hm, why did I choose to write a hero like Ewan? I guess because there are lots of Ewans out there, no matter their gender, who are told aspects of themselves are wrong or “not normal,” and they deserve happy endings, too.

  Madeline: Your books contain history that is not well known to many readers, especially regarding the profile of Southern society during the Civil War. Are there any research sources that you found particularly useful to you as you rebuilt that world? If a reader wants to learn more than the typical “headline” history of this period, to where would you direct them?

  Alyssa: For A Hope Divided, two books proved extremely helpful: Civil War in the North Carolina Quaker Belt: The Confederate Conspiracy Against Peace Agitators, Deserters, and Draft Dodgers by William T. Auman and The Long Shadow of the Civil War: Southern Dissent and Its Legacies by Victoria E. Bynum. These books are both <> who think their heritage is a Confederate flag just because they’re Southern<< might be surprised to find out what side their actual ancestors fought for or against.>>

  Madeline: While your books can stand alone, they are part of a series. How is the series forming, and how do you see it developing in the future?

  Alyssa: The series is meant to be an overview of the war from various perspectives. I’m currently working on book three, An Unconditional Freedom, which follows Daniel Cumberland, a Freedman who was kidnapped into slavery and now works for the Loyal League to mete out vengeance, and Janeta Sanchez, a Cuban Loyal League recruit with secrets of her own. It will deal with a few different issues, like Europe’s impact on the war. I have other ideas for the series in the works and would like to revisit some characters, but we’ll see how it goes.

  Madeline: Some readers comment that this book is women’s fiction, while others say it is a romance. Any thoughts about that, and which you thought you were writing?

  Alyssa: I see the Loyal League as historical romance.

  Madeline: Can you share your path to publication?

  Alyssa: Well, my first novel, Eagle’s Heart, was published in 2014, and I also started self-publishing historical romance anthologies featuring marginalized characters that year, too, so I’ve always been a hybrid author.

  Madeline: Do you have any advice for romance writers who want to write books with strong historical elements like yours?

  Alyssa: Just write it! I wrote An Extraordinary Union as a NaNoWriMo book to get it out of my system because I was sure no one else would want to read it but me. And I’ve had such a fantastic response from readers — I’m so glad I didn’t listen to the voice that said “no one wants Civil War romance.” Follow your heart (AND DO YOUR RESEARCH!!!!!) and see what happens. There are other caveats, like make sure the story is yours to tell, but there are better places to discuss that.

  Madeline: If your books could have one influence on publishing, reading and/or writing, what would it be?

  Alyssa: Haha, in an ideal world my books would end systemic racism in publishing, but alas, that’s probably not going to happen. I hope it influences both publishers and readers to try to acquire and read more historical romance by authors from marginalized groups, because there are many out there writing fantastic stuff. Beverly Jenkins, of course, and Piper Huguley and Lydia San Andres and EE Ottoman, to name a few.

  Madeline: Writing is a solitary endeavor, and many writers have support groups in the forms of colleagues, readers, critique groups, etc. What have yours been?

  Alyssa: Joining a critique group is what really got me more organized and on top of my writing. Suddenly I had deadlines and people to share ideas with and get feedback from. And after I published, I made friends online via social media and found support there, too!

  Madeline: Any advance info on what the next book is about?

  Alyssa: My next release is A Princess in Theory, the first book of the Reluctant Royals series with Avon. The heroine is an overworked public health grad student raised in foster care who starts getting e-mails saying she’s betrothed to the prince of a small African kingdom. She thinks it’s spam, but of course, there’s more to the e-mails than she ever imagined possible. (Fun fact: The working title of this book was Spam of Her Dreams.)

  USA TODAY and New York Times bestselling author Madeline Hunter is the author of 29 historical romances. Her latest book was The Most Dangerous Duke in London. More information about her books can be found at www.MadelineHunter.com.

• Smart Bitches, Trashy Books - http://smartbitchestrashybooks.com/podcast/176-romance-around-the-world-an-interview-with-alyssa-cole/

  176. Romance Around the World: An Interview with Alyssa Cole
  by SB Sarah · Jan 15, 2016 at 3:00 am · View all 14 comments

  Sarah interviews author Alyssa Cole about her series of articles for Romance Writers of America’s Romance Writers Report which focus on romance authors in different countries around the world. They discuss her upcoming books and her efforts to help readers diversify their reading lists. Plus, she has a movie recommendation for everyone everywhere. Special thanks to the birds of Martinique for making a background guest appearance.

  Transcript
  ❤ Click to view the transcript ❤
  [music]

  Sarah Wendell: Hello, and welcome to episode number 176 of the DBSA podcast. I’m Sarah Wendell from Smart Bitches, Trashy Books, and with me today is Alyssa Cole. We’re going to talk about her series of articles which have been appearing in the Romance Writers Report, the publication of the Romance Writers of America. Each of these articles feature different romance authors from countries around the world, and I think they have been super cool, so I wanted to learn more about them. We also talk about her upcoming books and her efforts to help readers diversify their reading lists, and she has a movie recommendation that I think everyone will want to take advantage of.

  This podcast is brought to you by Renee Ahdieh, author of The Wrath & the Dawn, published by G. P. Putnam’s Sons Books for Young Readers, available in print and eBook. Each dawn brings death, but can love change the story? This intoxicating retelling of A Thousand and One Nights will leave you begging for book two, The Rose & the Dagger, coming Summer 2016.

  The podcast transcript this month is sponsored by Kensington, publishers of Into the Fury by New York Times bestselling author Kat Martin. The first in a new series, Kat Martin is back with her signature spine-tingling suspense and unforgettable action as she introduces readers to the elite team of private investigators at BOSS INC., who are both hard-hitting and hot stuff. On sale January 29th, 2016.

  Our music is provided by Sassy Outwater, and I will have information at the end of the podcast as to who this is and where you can find it.

  And before we get started, two housekeeping notes: one, this podcast and all future podcasts are the production of Smart Bitches, Trashy Books, LLC, and if you, in any location around the world, would like to sponsor the podcast or the podcast transcript, please email me: Sarah@smartbitchestrashybooks.com.

  And now, on with the podcast!

  [music]

  Sarah: All right, so let’s have you introduce yourself to the lovely people who are listening, many of whom, I’ve learned, are on the treadmill or on the bike in the gym, so they’re all working out, which makes me feel really slack when I’m recording.

  [Laughter]

  Sarah: So introduce yourself and tell the lovely people listening who you are and what you do.

  Alyssa Cole: I’m also recording from a treadmill – no, I’m not. I’m sitting here. [Laughs] But –

  Sarah: Oh, is the treadmill in the room with you?

  Alyssa: I do have a treadmill, but it’s currently not in use, but I’m Alyssa Cole. I write romance, a variety of different romances: historical; post-apocalyptic sci-fi, I guess; romantic suspense; and contemporary. Just, I guess, under, pretty much anything under the romance umbrella.

  Sarah: Fabulous! Now, you’ve been writing a column for the Romance Writers Report, which is the RWA publication, about romance writers in different parts of the world, and I have been enjoying this column so much. Was this your idea?

  Alyssa: Thank you! Yes, it randomly came to me. I don’t know why – well, I think, I mean, even anyone who reads my stuff, my books or just in general, I’m really interested in the way cultures and different kinds of people interact with each other, and I think just one day I was thinking, like, I don’t really, I know there have to be other kinds of romance writers or – [laughs] – and I think, I bet if it was, like, you know, there’s a lot of talk about diversity and, like, normalizing the representation in romance right now?

  Sarah: Mm-hmm.

  Alyssa: And I was thinking, like, you know, most of the people I know are either American or Canadian or British, and I –

  Sarah: There’s a couple of Aussies, couple of Kiwis, but, yeah.

  Alyssa: Yeah, some Australian, Kiwis, and – I was like, I know there have to be other people in the world who are into romance, who enjoy writing romance. I know people have romance fans all over the world, so I was just, it was, like, a random thought while I was going to sleep, and you know those thoughts that you get, and then they start building, and I was like, well, maybe I’ll see if anyone else is interested in this, because sometimes people are not interested in the things that I’m interested in, and I pitched it to the Romance Writers Report, and they were like, yeah, that sounds like a good idea, so I started looking around for different publishers around the world, which I can talk about that a little more. It’s not always easy. But – [laughs]

  Sarah: Oh, I’d love to hear about that, because I’ve noticed that it can be very challenging to find – I’ve been looking for romances that are published in other countries that aren’t translations of American romances. Like, who are –

  Alyssa: Yeah.

  Sarah: – the local writers in different countries who are writing romances, and that’s really hard to find. How did you start your research?

  Alyssa: The first article I did was about Ankara Press, which is a Nigerian romance publisher –

  Sarah: Mm-hmm.

  Alyssa: – and I saw an article about them, and I was like, okay, cool! That was pretty easy for me, because it had their name. I could –

  [Laughter]

  Alyssa: They were, they were relatively easy to find. They’re pretty, they have a web presence and, you know, a web site and –

  Sarah: Whoa!

  Alyssa: – publicity department, and so I reached out, and they were pretty, they were great about getting back to me, about answering questions, because also, for them, they’re also looking for publicity, these romance publishers and writers around the world, because most of the market is in the U.S. and, and the Western countries, so, it, they are, usually once they realize that you aren’t, like, a scam artist – [laughs] – or someone trying to get something from them, it’s pretty, it’s pretty easy to get an interview with them or have them answer some questions.

  Sarah: I hear birds on your end, and I have a dog barking on my end. Tell me you have pet birds, or is that just, like, the, the general sound of an island is bird.

  Alyssa: [Laughs] This is just the general sound. I’m –

  Sarah: Oh, that’s horrible.

  Alyssa: – I actually am pretty used to it, so –

  [Laughter]

  Sarah: That’s just terrible. Oh, gosh.

  Alyssa: But, yeah, they’re, they’re just like, you know, birds hanging outside in the trees and –

  Sarah: Yelling.

  Alyssa: Yeah.

  Sarah: All right, so –

  Alyssa: And then –

  Sarah: – tropical birds, podcast guest, I am 100% on board with this.

  Alyssa: [Laughs] And these are the quiet birds. There are also kind of these, like, parrot-type birds that fly by every night and scream as they fly by.

  [Laughter]

  Alyssa: So these, these are the quiet –

  Sarah: That must be great.

  [Laughter]

  Sarah: Okay. So what are some of the countries, ‘cause I know not everyone who listens is an RWA member and gets this publication, and I, seriously, I have enjoyed these articles so much. I think they are excellent, so thank you for the entire idea. It has totally made every month better when I get that issue. What are –

  Alyssa: And –

  Sarah: – oh, please! Keep going! What are some of the countries and writers that you’ve discovered, and how have you been doing the interviews? Is there a lot of Google Translate?

  Alyssa: There hasn’t been so far. So first, with Ankara Press it was speaking with Nigerian authors and authors from that general region, and everyone, pretty much, people speak English there –

  Sarah: Right, yes.

  Alyssa: – as well as whatever local language they have, so that was fairly simple. Then I did South Asian romance, and I actually regret this one, because when I first started I didn’t realize how, that it would become an ongoing column, and so I condensed. Instead of doing Indian romance, Pakistani romance, I made a South Asian column –

  Sarah: Oops.

  Alyssa: – and again, people there speak English, but that’s, if I could change one thing I would go back and focus on the individual countries and, you know, even individual regions in the country. Hope-, maybe I can do that as time goes on, but yeah, so, authors there speak English.

  Sarah: Right.

  Alyssa: Then the next one I did was Argentina. [Laughs] That was where the Google Translate problem first cropped up –

  Sarah: Mm-hmm.

  Alyssa: – because – I mean, and I know Google Translate sucks because, you know, my husband speaks French, and I’m learning French. When we were first dating, sometimes there would be, you know, I don’t know what you’re talking about – [laughs] – and then I would Google Translate it, and it also, I wouldn’t know what he was talking –

  Sarah: [Laughs]

  Alyssa: – but for some – [laughs] – for some reason I thought it would be easier with Spanish, but it was not. I’m sure the, the questions I sent them, I’m amazed that they understood what I was, what I was talking about and the answered questions so well, and then I translated them with Google Translate, and I was like, I have, this doesn’t make sense, and I know that these women know what they’re talking about, so this is the Google translate, and then I was saved by Mr. Cole, who also speaks Spanish, and I was like, hey, can you help?

  Sarah: What does this mean?

  [Laughter]

  Alyssa: Yeah, this doesn’t mean that, does it? Because there were just some things that were like just weird, totally weird or inappropriate, and I was like, I don’t think that’s what they’re saying, and that was not what they were saying. So that’s, one thing I learned is for – and, like, I speak, I understand a bit of Spanish, and even with that I was like, I’m, I think you’re wrong, Google Translate. [Laughs]

  Sarah: Yeah.

  Alyssa: But, so that was my first encounter really with, like, realizing that I’m going to have to put a little more – like, I can’t wing it with Google Translate. I have to find someone who speaks the language fluently to help me translate it, because it’s not fair to the authors if I ask them for an interview and then, like, put down some crazy response, which they might, they might not see and be able to correct if they don’t speak English. So that’s one thing that in 2016 I’ll be working on more too, like, reaching out to people and countries that are not primarily English-speaking –

  Sarah: Mm-hmm.

  Alyssa: – or don’t have a large English-speaking population and also getting, like, accurate translations of the work. And also, the, the last place that, the last column was, was Filipino romance writers, and they also all spoke English as well, so.

  Sarah: Yes. So what have you learned from the different writers?

  Alyssa: The thing that’s interesting to me is, like, the similarities, as well as the differences, but the simil- – like, I think that romance writers everywhere are similar in ways –

  Sarah: Yep.

  Alyssa: – and one thing that’s interesting to me is that basically we all have the same origin type, like, we all basically read the same kind of books. Everyone was reading Judith McNaught, Nora Roberts, and, like, all of the big names in romance. Like, they read those all over the worlds, those, Mills & Boon, Harlequin influence people all over the world, and, like, it’s interesting now because I feel like now the results of people growing up and reading those books and with the current technology we have, those things are coming together and allowing people who maybe wanted to write romance before but didn’t have the, the, there was no resource or no outlet for them to do that. Now that technology is spreading because of the internet, romance writers all over the world are able to write the kind of romance they love with their own, but adding their own, you know, cultural elements or just their own personal, even beyond culture, their own spin on it, and I think that’s a really great thing, and I think that’s something that’s even happening in the U.S. right now with the –

  Sarah: Mm-hmm.

  Alyssa: – diverse, trying to diversify and, you know, make publishing, romance publishing reflect the reality of the world more than it does right now.

  Sarah: And the women who read it and the women who write it.

  Alyssa: Yeah, and, like, so that, I just found that, like, so fascinating, just, like, thinking that all over the world, there are all these, you know, young women, and men too, growing up and reading these books, and the fact that romance has that all over the world, basically.

  Sarah: I remember when I learned that, I was shocked, because I would receive email regularly from people who would start their email by apologizing for their English and then explain to me that they learned English solely so that they could read romance because where they live romance is not translated into their language, and because that’s what they wanted to read, they learned English, and I, I had that message sent to me more than five times from five different countries, and I was sort of like, are you serious? Like, if the only thing that I wanted to read was in a different language and I had to lead, learn to read the language in order to get my hands on it, that’s a staggering amount of dedication right there!

  Alyssa: Yeah! They, romance fans, when they say romance fans are the most dedicated –

  Sarah: They are not lying!

  Alyssa: Yeah.

  Sarah: That is legit true. [Laughs]

  Alyssa: The other thing that I noticed that’s interesting, again, all around the world, it’s generally written by women and read by women, although – and, you know, here, too, there, in the U.S. and England and Canada, too, there are guys who read romance, but in other places, like with the Ankara Press, the Nigerian press –

  Sarah: Mm-hmm.

  Alyssa: They, one thing that was really interesting to me is that there’s really no stigma for men reading romance novels in that region. I don’t know if that’s true of other places in Africa, but they said, like, you know, you can be at the airport and see a dude reading a Mills & Boon, and it’s not like, oh, check that out! Like, it’s not considered a weird thing, just because reading is reading, no matter what you’re reading. So I found that really interesting.

  Sarah: Wow! That is interesting, ‘cause I, I remember very clearly seeing a, a gentleman in the Taco Bell one time when I went with my husband, and he was reading Nora Roberts – not J. D. Robb, but, like, Nora Roberts – and I, and I was like, okay, it is against the readers’ code for me to interrupt this gentleman’s meal while he’s reading, but I really wanted to be like, you are the best, dude! You rock! ‘Cause he was just totally chilling in Taco Bell with a big old Nora Roberts novel, and I was like, yes! Because it’s not something I would see very often, and I wish I saw more of. How cool that it, there’s no male-female stigma attached to it in Nigeria!

  Alyssa: Yeah, and I think that’s, you know, it’s just a societal thing. I mean, in most places I’ve, where I’ve spoken to authors, there, there is the general romance, you know, romance versus real fiction type argument, that, the same that we have here, and people seeing romances as less than or not serious writing, but everyone I spoke to everywhere else just said that that was changing and that the books were getting more respect, predictably as they became bigger moneymakers for publishers and authors. [Laughs]

  Sarah: No! The devil you say!

  Alyssa: You know! Who would imagine, but yes. So I think that’s something that is being reflected, you know, around the world, but I think there is still the kind of, in many places there is still the kind of stigma of feminine literature and not – I think, hopefully that’s slowly fading away – oh, quickly, but, you know.

  Sarah: Mm-hmm.

  Alyssa: Slowly too. Either, any kind of fading away will be good, because it’s just, you know, there’re, I’m sure there are dudes who would love romance if they gave it a try and – [laughs] – but there’s just this whole societal, you know, misogynistic idea that that’s something men can’t do, which is ridiculous. So it was, yeah, it was really refreshing to see that, you know, in at least one place in the world, there’s no kind of gendered reading preference for romance.

  Sarah: How is success measured in other countries? I’m always curious about this. If you’re an author and you’re publishing in a genre that’s slowly gaining respect in your, in your country, are there bestseller lists there? Are there measurements or – how are they determining success? Is that something that you talked about in your interviews?

  Alyssa: I, actually, that’s an in-, a really good question. I haven’t asked about bestseller lists. I generally have asked about their own, like, if I’m speaking to authors or to the publisher, like, why they write what they write –

  Sarah: Mm-hmm.

  Alyssa: – how they interact with other authors and with readers, but I haven’t asked generally about success, just because, yeah, it is something that I think is, in different places can be interpreted differently.

  Sarah: Mm-hmm.

  Alyssa: For example, when I was speaking, when I interviewed the Filipino authors, they were, you know, they all seem like they have all, they’re very organized and have all of their stuff together, but there are certain things that hinder them, like, many people in the Philippines don’t have e-readers.

  Sarah: Mm-hmm.

  Alyssa: So, like, they couldn’t really measure their success there as well as they, as someone in a Western country who is mostly published in the United States and has most of their readers in the United States.

  Sarah: Yes.

  Alyssa: So there are things like that, and also the people who are self-published, as opposed to people who are with local publishers and, like, the local publishing scene as opposed, like, compared to the big five here, for example. So that’s something, and that’s also something else that I want to explore more this year, like, speaking to publishers and editors, more, more focused on publishers and editors as well, in addition to romance authors –

  Sarah: Mm-hmm.

  Alyssa: – because I think it would be great to know how those things are measured in other countries.

  Sarah: Definitely. How many more articles are in your series?

  Alyssa: As of right now, it’s ongoing.

  Sarah: Yay! I’m happy!

  Alyssa: And right – [laughs]. As, but yeah, as I said earlier, it can be hard finding people?

  Sarah: Mm-hmm.

  Alyssa: One, because of the language barrier. That’s getting a bit easier because I’m learning French, so I can try to interact with people in, for example, French-speaking, Francophone Africa and places like that, but –

  Sarah: Go you!

  Alyssa: – other places can be harder, and also places that don’t rely that much on the internet for reading.

  Sarah: Mm-hmm.

  Alyssa: That can be harder because, like, they won’t have, like, a, a website with all of the information you need, so a lot of it is like being a detective sometimes. You, like, look, you know, Google search romance in a general region, and, like, the other thing that’s funny is when I search, for example, Middle Eastern romance, all of the sheikh novels come up, and I’m like, that’s cool, but that’s not what I’m looking for.

  [Laughter]

  Alyssa: I’m looking for romance written by – so, like, you know, you have to change your search parameters and then also – and in some places there are books that are just, you know, published very locally and just given directly to the small bookstores, and, like, that’s something, something that I likely won’t be able to contact those people because I, you know, they’re not on the internet really. It’s just a very small, local thing. But yeah, so I was basically, like, looking for articles, looking for a trail to a certain country or a region and then trying to find, dig up more and see – you know, sometimes you find something and then you look into it, and you see, okay, this person’s or these people stopped publishing.

  Sarah: Mm-hmm.

  Alyssa: Or this publisher went under. Like, you know, just how things change. Publishing is always changing here, and it’s definitely always changing in other countries too, as either things don’t work out or people move onto a new venture, so then, you know. So it’s a, that part is frustrating sometimes, but it’s also cool because it’s just seeing how things change in other countries as well.

  Sarah: Mm-hmm. Definitely. And, you know, what, what’s written down on the internet can very quickly become out of date in a matter of, you know, months.

  Alyssa: Oh, yeah. [Laughs] Ohhh, yeah.

  Sarah: So what countries are you working on now? Can you tell us?

  Alyssa: Yeah! Well, right now I, I am working on east African romance. I’m looking, I’m trying, I’m trying to get in contact with some romance authors in Kenya; also some romance author, a publisher in Mali I’m trying to get in contact with; and I’m also thinking of, like, look-, I’m also looking for Caribbean romance authors, just in general, either here in Martinique or, you know, on the surrounding islands, but like I said, it’s like you search and you search and you see someone, and it’s like, are they really from the place where they, it says they’re from, and you know, things like that, that can change – [laughs] – can be, like, can make things a bit difficult while you’re searching, but – and I also want to try to reach out to countries like, you know, China, Russia, but like – and that’s another thing. Some, in some places, romance, you have to learn what the local terms for romance are, because in some countries, like, for example, when you search Russian romance, the things that come up are, like, Dostoevsky and stuff like that. So –

  [Laughter]

  Alyssa: Which, you know, again, that’s cool, but not what I’m looking for. So, so it’s, it’s interesting, and now that I know that this series of articles will be ongoing, it will just be refining the process of searching and trying to expand and see, you know, who I can find and who’s willing to talk, and again, I think sometimes people might receive my emails and think I’m some kind of, like, you know, scam artist, because people who work for publishers get all kinds of crazy emails, so – [laughs]

  Sarah: Oh, yeah.

  Alyssa: And I’m just like, oh, hello, I am a romance writer from the U.S. and blah blah blah. They don’t know if I’m telling the truth or if I want something from them so, you know, it could be, it can be a little hard, but it’s definitely worth it. This is my favorite project that I’m working on right now because it’s just cool seeing, you know, how people work in other countries, and like I said, I love learning about the similarities, the differences, and the things that generally make us all the same in the end, so.

  Sarah: Mm-hmm. Especially because the romance genre, no matter what sort of flavor you’re writing, still has the same core emotions, and –

  Alyssa: Yeah.

  Sarah: – those translate very easily. The, those are, those are easily understood concepts, regardless of the language that the book is written in.

  Alyssa: Yeah, and it’s cool because, like, even, one of the questions I like to ask is, like, what romance is popular –

  Sarah: Mm-hmm.

  Alyssa: – in, in your region? And I feel like that can kind of reflect what’s going on in a general area. Like, for the South Asian romances, a lot of the, most of the authors said that college romances were really popular, and –

  Sarah: Mm-hmm.

  Alyssa: – well, you know, I guess that would translate to New Adult –

  Sarah: Yep.

  Alyssa: – here, but, like, kind of, if there is a boom of people that age and, like, that’s a big thing, people going off and, you know, women going off to college and the new experiences that they have, I think that’s pretty cool. And, like, in Argentina historicals are really popular, because people love, like, looking, like, looking back in time at – historicals are popular here in the U.S., too, but in general, like, British historicals? [Laughs] But, so, in Argentina, people are really into the history of their country, and they love reading historical romances about that. So I think it’s interesting, too, seeing, like, what readers there are into and how that reflects in the romance that’s getting written.

  Sarah: That is very cool. Have you been able to find any of the books that the authors you’ve interviewed have, have read? ‘Cause I know that there is a, an enormous barrier to entering the American book market because that, less than five percent of the total book market is books that are brought in in translation, that it’s very rare for books to be translated and brought into America. Most of the time we export everything.

  Alyssa: Yeah.

  Sarah: So have you been able to locate some of the books that you’ve read about, or are they still mostly available in those countries and in the surrounding countries?

  Alyssa: Actually, most of the people that I have spoken to have books available on Amazon –

  Sarah: Fabulous!

  Alyssa: Yeah, even, like, Ankara Press, the Nigerian press, they even have, like, a free, they did a free Valentine’s Day book, and if you go to their website, they have the link to that, the link to the authors. The South Asian authors that I interviewed, some of them are published through Harlequin India, so, and Mills & Boon India, and so their books are available, you know, on Amazon and through that website. The Filipino authors also, they have, all of their books are available on Amazon.

  Sarah: Yes.

  Alyssa: – I’m pretty sure. [Laughs] And the Argentine authors, they’re also available on Amazon for the most part, I think, but again there’s a language barrier for people who don’t speak Spanish. The other books are generally in English, and that’s another thing that’s interesting. Many of the people that I’ve inter-, the publishers and the people I’ve interviewed, right, in English, just because that’s the international language of romance. You know, French is the language of love, but English is the language of romance, apparently.

  [Laughter]

  Alyssa: So, that’s, and that’s, like you said before, people who learn English just to read romance, that’s just in general –

  Sarah: Mm-hmm.

  Alyssa: – people write in English so it’s marketable to the largest population of romance readers, which, which are, is, who are English-speaking.

  Sarah: Right, of course.

  Alyssa: The other interesting thing is that people, in addition to writing in English, though, people do publish translations into their languages or even local dialects, so that’s something that’s pretty cool as well, making it, they also make the books available for people who don’t speak English.

  Sarah: That’s very cool! So I want to switch topics to a much more difficult and very challenging question.

  Alyssa: Okay.

  Sarah: I want to ask you about your books.

  Alyssa: Oh!

  Sarah: [Laughs]

  Alyssa: Okay. Hopefully I can answer that.

  [Laughter]

  Sarah: Well, sometimes it’s like, oh, gosh, talking about my own books is so hard, which I completely understand. What are you working on right now?

  Alyssa: Right now I’m in the middle of edits for my next series, which is a Civil War espionage series with Kensington, and I don’t think I’ve really told anyone about that yet, so breaking news.

  Sarah: Yay!

  Alyssa: [Laughs] It’s a Civil War espionage series focusing on people of color and their contribution to the Civil War effort, and the fir-, and also somewhat based on, many of the characters are based on real people, real historical figures.

  Sarah: This is cool!

  Alyssa: So, yeah, I’m in edits for the first book, and I’m really excited. Like, my, I love writing all types of things, but I really love writing historicals too, just because, you know, it gets my, I’m able to do my little sneaky teaching, as –

  [Laughter]

  Alyssa: – as well as writing romance and, you know, getting the love and sexytimes and stuff in there too. So, yeah, I’m working on that right now, and I’m also, I don’t know when that will be out, but I’ll hopefully have more information about that soon. And I’m working on book two of that now, too, of that series. And I’m also working on finishing up a contemporary fairy tale, not exactly a fairy tale. It’s a romantic comedy, there’s an African prince, and the heroine is, you know, and, and getting her Master’s in public health, and it’s a romantic comedy, even though, like, romantic comedy is hard for me because I’m always tempted to put something really depressing in the story. [Laughs] Like, I had to convince myself not to put an Ebola outbreak in the story. Like, no, that’s not romantic comedy. So I’m working on that now, and yeah. And more “Romancing the Globe” stuff, but –

  Sarah: Yay! So what is your most recent book that has been published in your, what, what is the most recent book that has come out from your excellent backlist?

  Alyssa: My most recent book would be Mixed Signals. That’s book three in my Off the Grid trilogy, which is a post-apocalyptic romance series, and it’s, it came out in October. It follows, the series follows a family/group of friends who survive a post-apocalyptic, an apocalyptic event –

  Sarah: Mm-hmm.

  Alyssa: – and are living in a post-apocalyptic world, and it’s the book, the third book, following the youngest sister in the, in the family, and it’s basically post-apocalyptic New Adult because it’s, you know, the world is trying to get back on its feet, and she’s entering this – [clears throat] pardon me – she’s entering this basically post-apocalyptic college, and so, but it came out in October, and it’s, it was nominated for an RT award. People seemed to really like it, which made me happy because I was like, this is the book that’s going to make everyone hate me, and the –

  [Laughter]

  Alyssa: – and then people were like, oh, no, we actually like this book, so that, you know, that –

  Sarah: Yay! Why did you think people would hate you?

  Alyssa: I don’t know. You know, authors put a lot of pressure on themselves, and, like, I was just –

  Sarah: No!

  Alyssa: – you know, terrified. I was like, maybe I, you know, maybe it’s crappy. Like, you know, you, you convince yourself of all of the things that are wrong with your book – [laughs] – so I was very happy when that wasn’t the case.

  Sarah: Fabulous! Nice job. [Laughs] Isn’t it nice when you’re wrong?

  Alyssa: [Laughs] Yeah, well, things, for things like that, definitely. Yeah, so that was the last book. The whole series, well, it was a trilogy. All three books came out last year, and they’re post-apocalyptic, but they’re not zombie, it’s not zombie stories, which, I love zombie stories, but – I guess it’s kind of like gentle post-apocalyptic in a way?

  [Laughter]

  Alyssa: Oh, I don’t know if that’s a genre, but it’s, you know, I feel, like a bit more realistic or not, like, there aren’t zombies chasing people down. It’s more about the human issues that come up?

  Sarah: Right. Because survival when things are going incredibly wrong is pretty compelling.

  Alyssa: Yeah. And also, like, how love and friendship and hot dudes and hot chicks can get you through that. [Laughs]

  Sarah: Yeah, it’s, it’s very difficult. [Laughs] And your, that, that book, Mixed Signals was named one of the best romances for November by Sarah McLean in her Washington Post column, yeah?

  Alyssa: Yes. Yeah, it was. That was –

  Sarah: That’s awesome! Congratulations!

  Alyssa: Thank you! Yeah, that was really awesome, really shocking. It was –

  [Laughter]

  Alyssa: I was traveling, so I was in a hotel and just, like, rolling around on the bed in the hotel room. That was really great.

  Sarah: That is very cool! So, here’s the hardest question that I ask: what are you reading or have read recently that you recommend? Do you read a lot of science fiction?

  Alyssa: Right now I don’t. I mean, growing up I read, you know, Asimov and all different kinds of science fictions that I –

  Sarah: Right.

  Alyssa: – would take out from the library.

  Sarah: Mm-hmm.

  Alyssa: Right now – and I’m totally blanking, even though I just wrote a review, a bunch of reviews on my blog, but the books that I’ve read recently – oh! I read A Midnight Clear; that’s by Emma Barry and Genevieve Turner, and it’s a free, you know, freebie novella that’s really, really, really good. [Laughs] It’s –

  Sarah: Ooh, hello! I’m listening.

  Alyssa: – it’s part of their historical, they have, like, a, a historical series set during the 1960s, the space race?

  Sarah: Mm-hmm.

  Alyssa: And this is a prequel set at the end of the 1940s, and it’s just, like, really well written, and I told them I was like, I was getting really angry – [laughs] – while I was reading it, ‘cause I was just like, why is this is so good? Like, I’m getting mad!

  [Laughter]

  Alyssa: I don’t know if anyone, I don’t know if anyone else has that feeling of, like, when you’re reading a book and you’re just like, how dare you be this entertaining and good?

  Sarah: [Laughs]

  Alyssa: I, you know, have a temper problem, so maybe that’s just me. What else? I’ve read some Jeannie Lin that I really enjoyed from her, her steampunk series. What else have I read? Courtney Milan’s Once Upon a Marquess, of course.

  Sarah: Right.

  Alyssa: Amazing. Tessa Dare’s latest: amazing. And also, like, I’m tot-, it’s also hard because I’m trying to remember stuff that I’ve read, like, what is actually released? [Laughs] What am I –

  Sarah: I have this problem. I very much have this problem.

  Alyssa: What am I allowed to talk about? Suleikha Snyder’s Unlock Me serial written under the pseudonym Mariah K. Quinn, which is, like, in the stepbrother BDSM type romance, which is awesome. You know, not something I thought I would say, but –

  [Laughter]

  Alyssa: – but it’s really well written and awesome. Also, lately I’ve been loving Melissa Blue. She has her Scotland series; the books are Under His Kilt. And also Tasha L. Harrison, her series, In Her Closet is the first book, I believe, in the series.

  Sarah: In his closet?

  Alyssa: In Her Closet.

  Sarah: Oh, In Her Closet. There’s, there’s two different closets.

  Alyssa: Yes.

  Sarah: My bad. Okay, I got it. Got to get the right closet!

  Alyssa: Yeah. [Laughs] For Rebekah Weatherspoon, her latest, So Sweet, which is a novella about a young woman who gets a sugar daddy, but it’s totally funny, sweet, and super romantic and, like, just made me laugh out loud the entire time I was reading it. I always recommend that because, like, you know, there’s so much crappy stuff going on in the world, like when you just need to read something and really laugh and feel happy and light when you’re done, I recommend Rebekah Weatherspoon.

  Sarah: I was not expecting to like So Sweet as much as I did, ‘cause I sort of approached it like, okay, sugar daddy relationship, not so sure about that.

  Alyssa: [Laughs]

  Sarah: Not like I have a, a problem with anyone who would do that? Like, you do you, that’s fine. I just wasn’t sure if it was going to work for me as a reader and my, you know, expectations of romance, and gosh, did that work for me so well!

  Alyssa: Yeah, it was –

  Sarah: You’re exactly right; it’s, it’s very light and friendly and funny.

  Alyssa: Yeah. Yeah. And it, it’s just like, and I feel like I love, in her writing, there’s, like, the unexpected humor, where you’re like, it’s not that, you expect it to be funny, but a line just hits you at just the right angle, like –

  Sarah: Yes.

  Alyssa: – they’re like, what, where did that come from? And you just, like, burst out laughing.

  [Laughter]

  Alyssa: So, yeah. I recommend that. And the other stuff I’ve been reading is, like, horrible Civil War research so – [laughs] – which I recommend, but also not the greatest light reading material.

  Sarah: No, it’s not super uplifting and –

  Alyssa: No.

  Sarah: – feel-good.

  Alyssa: [Laughs] No.

  Sarah: It’s, it’s kind of feel-crappy, that research.

  Alyssa: Yeah.

  Sarah: Can you talk a little bit about the, the espionage series? Can you, can you share a little bit more details, or is it too soon?

  Alyssa: Oh, no, I’ll share some details now. The first book follows a woman, she’s a free black woman living in the North –

  Sarah: Mm-hmm.

  Alyssa: – but she, she joins a secret society and goes undercover. She poses as a slave in Civil War Richmond to funnel information to, you know, to the soci-, secret society and to Washing-, to the capitol, and, so she’s the heroine, and the hero is a Scottish-American, he’s a spy working for Pinkerton’s, for Allan Pinkerton, who – I don’t know if, if readers don’t know about Allan Pinkerton, he basically originated the Secret Service, and also there’s the Pinkerton Detective Agency, which, it’s still around today.

  Sarah: Yep.

  Alyssa: So basically, he’s posing as a Confederate soldier, so – [laughs]

  Sarah: Everybody’s lying.

  Alyssa: Yeah, everyone’s lying –

  Sarah: Perfect!

  Alyssa: – and, you know, of course that can cause trouble in all kinds of things, including love. So it’s basically about them kind of being forced to work together. He’s smitten with her, and she’s like, you know, are you insane? Get – [laughs] – get out. Do you see the situation that we’re in? And the country that we’re in? But, you know, it’s about people – it was really fun to write, because you get to write “fun” spy stuff, but, and also, you know, the, the growing love and, between two people who, in a time when generally they were told, you know, you should not be together. I mean, we’re, like, it’s during a period where they’re fighting a war. [Laughs]

  Sarah: Right. It’s not really convenient.

  Alyssa: Yeah.

  Sarah: [Laughs]

  Alyssa: So, so, yeah. It’s really, it was really fun to write, and, you know, it’s set during the Civil War, but it, so there is some heavy stuff, but overall I, you know, I try to keep it fun, exciting, you know, a lot of banter between the hero and heroine, so, yeah, I’m really excited about it.

  Sarah: Cool! That’s excellent. Do you, do you have a title for it yet?

  Alyssa: The title is still in flux right now? [Laughs]

  Sarah: Titles change. This I know.

  Alyssa: But I, I will hopefully know soon.

  Sarah: And when is this scheduled to come out? Sometime –

  Alyssa: That is also – [laughs] – that is also in flux, but, you know, sometime this year.

  Sarah: It is 2016, right? Yes, yes, it is. Okay, good.

  Alyssa: Yep. Yep.

  Sarah: I, not only have I not been able to remember what year it is, but I have been dating things incorrectly on the website, so I published a podcast in 2015, like a year ago, and it was supposed to be 2016? Yeah! Good job! This is way more troublesome than writing the wrong date on a check.

  [Laughter]

  Alyssa: Oh, yeah. And people are like, oh, how come no new podcasts are coming up?

  Sarah: Yeah, ‘cause they, they came out today but actually last year. You know, things happen.

  [Laughter]

  Sarah: So are you going to be going to RT or RWA this year? Are you doing any panels at RT?

  Alyssa: I am! I’m going to RT for sure, and I’m pretty positive I’m going to RWA. At RT, I’m doing a panel – and this is actually my first RT convention, so I’m a little freaked out – [laughs] – because I’ve heard that RT is even crazier than RWA, and the last RWA I was just like a completely drained battery after it was done. But I –

  Sarah: Yes, it is very draining. Get ready.

  Alyssa: [Laughs] And in Las Vegas, so, yeah. But my, I’m doing a couple of panels. One panel is called “Diversify Your TBR,” and it’s basically just going to talk about popular books, popular multicultural books and, like, basically, if you like this kind of book or you like books by this author –

  Sarah: Mm-hmm.

  Alyssa: – perhaps you should try these authors or, and these books.

  Sarah: So like a discovery tool.

  Alyssa: Yeah.

  Sarah: Cool!

  Alyssa: Because, just because, you know, sometimes people don’t, just don’t know about different authors, and we figure – Lena Hart is the author who, who is moderating and who submitted that panel, but I think it’s a great idea because, you know, people always are looking for new books like the books that they enjoy, and I think that’s a really great way of getting people to expand their horizons.

  Sarah: Right.

  Alyssa: And then the other panel is a historical panel exploring the exciting new world of inclusive historical romance, and so it’s just talking about, you know, the different, how historical romance is growing and changing to include stories that weren’t necessarily always told, or if they were told perhaps weren’t the, at the forefront of romance. We’ll just be talking about how, you know, historical romance is changing for the better.

  Sarah: So, so there were, there, there weren’t just white people in history?

  Alyssa: [Laughs]

  Sarah: Really?

  Alyssa: Yeah, I know it’s surprising. If you, you know, watch –

  Sarah: [Laughs]

  Alyssa: – watch TV, read a book, or anything, that’s what it seems like. I’m really glad that it’s changing. I wish it would change more quickly. I think it’s changing quickly for the better. I wish it would change even more quickly, but, just because I feel, and, like, one of the things that motivates a lot of what I do is I feel like there’s just so much information, and it’s out there, and it’s available, but it’s kind of pushed behind the predominant ideas and media and in pop culture and in society in general, so I, I really enjoy exploring those ideas and also, like, exposing other people to them. Learning, I mean, a lot of my stuff that I write is just, like, I get interested in something, and I’m like, oh, this would make a cool romance. Or, you know, this is something that people might find interesting, because I find it interesting, but –

  Sarah: And, and there’s always someone.

  Alyssa: Yeah.

  Sarah: There’s always someone who’s interested. Like, I have many, many recurrences of I, I can’t be the only one that thinks this is really cool, right?

  Alyssa: [Laughs]

  Sarah: And then you sign on and there’s, like, this huge group of people who are like, that’s awesome! Let’s talk about this for hours!

  Alyssa: Yeah, and, like, especially with historical romance, I just feel like there’s so much stuff there to be discovered and that make for great, make for great stories in general –

  Sarah: Mm-hmm.

  Alyssa: – but especially great romances. I know sometimes, like, one thing that gets kind of iffy is people are like, oh, but, you know, I know bad things happened around that time period or to a certain group of people, and I don’t know if I can get past that when I’m reading a romance, but – I mean, I find that idea ridiculous, because if you think about any type of historical romance, terrible things were happening all of the time.

  [Laughter]

  Alyssa: If you read it, if you read any Westerns, those people were going to die of dysentery. Like –

  Sarah: Yep.

  Alyssa: – if you read any Regency historical, you know that countess or whoever, after she worked so hard to get her duke and found the love of her life, she’s going to die during childbirth. Like – [laughs] – not to be a, not to be a downer, but like –

  Sarah: [Laughs]

  Alyssa: – that’s why, that’s why that particular argument is strange to me, because it just – and I think it’s just because people have been kind of trained, in a way, by the stories that are generally presented in, in media and in literature and in, on TV and movie screens. It’s like, oh, this seems, like, plausible, but oh, no, that thing, that couldn’t happen. But it’s like, actually that did happen. It’s historically accurate and, like –

  Sarah: Yep.

  Alyssa: – it’s just, like, you know, we’ve just been kind of trained to think, oh, well, that couldn’t happen, because I’ve never really seen that happen before. No one has ever explicitly said, here is a movie, or here is a, you know, a book about this particular thing –

  Sarah: Mm-hmm.

  Alyssa: – and that’s why I think that, like, really more inclusive romance is important, for me especially, historical romance, but all types of romance and, you know, all types of literature, but I think just exposing people to these ideas that – and I don’t want to call them new ideas, because they’re not new. It’s just less represented ideas that are, you know, they are historically accurate and make just as much sense as any other story you would read in romance, except the only difference being that they haven’t been traditionally represented, so they can seem implausible, or – and I think that the implausibility is just kind of the brain’s reaction to, well, how come I never saw this before if this was possible? So, you know.

  Sarah: And also –

  Alyssa: Is showing, expanding the, the idea of what was possible and wasn’t to meet act-, reality.

  Sarah: And also the idea that, for a lot of readers, when they go back to a familiar setting, whether it’s a particular science fiction world or a historical, or even a particular made-up small town with a cute name in a contemporary setting, the familiarity of the worldbuilding is part of what they’re drawn to, so the unfamiliar can be, can be met with a lot of resistance that is not necessarily justified, you know what I mean?

  Alyssa: Yeah. Yeah, I definitely agree with that, but I think that’s, you know, like I said, I think it’s changing.

  Sarah: Yes.

  Alyssa: Hopefully it keeps changing and just, like how I was saying before that, for peop-, for writers all around the world, the internet, social media, and just access to other people has changed their ability to get the word out about their product or even just to know that there are other people like them, like, in their own country or in their general region, who are writing what they write and –

  Sarah: Yep.

  Alyssa: – like, reading what they read. I think the same thing will work for more representative romance, just because, for me, it’s just a given. Like, it’s, some people see it as, like, oh, why is this being pushed? I think that there can be a bit of resistance to the change, to change in, like, going back to what you said, people are comfortable with a certain thing, but I think after, hopefully after an initial discomfort, people will realize, oh, well this, just, not just my reality, and, like, maybe people on a certain level realize that the romance they’re reading doesn’t always match reality, and again, we’re not always reading romance for reality –

  Sarah: Right.

  Alyssa: – but as far as representation goes, there’s absolutely no reason for at least the representation of different races and cultures to be realistic, because, you know, like many people have said, if you can read about dragons –

  [Laughter]

  Alyssa: – vampires –

  Sarah: I’m here for the dragons. [Laughs]

  Alyssa: – like – yeah! Everyone loves dragons.

  Sarah: Yep.

  Alyssa: So, you know, there’s no reason for it to see, like, a demographic shift as somehow being bad or something that needs to – yeah, I don’t quite know how to phrase this. Like, it’s just a, it’s just a shift in who gets to tell stories and who you’re reading about. The general format, structure of romance is not changing, so I don’t really see it as, there shouldn’t be a problem with reading about different types of people, and you can’t see me, but I have air quotation marks around types, because, you know, in general, people all, like, just as with the “Romancing the Globe” column, the thing that it comes down to is that we’re all basically have the same desires –

  Sarah: Yep.

  Alyssa: – the same need for happiness and to connect with other people, because that’s the other thing, too. Like, talking to these other romance authors and seeing, it’s like everyone reaches out to find their romance-writing buddy. It’s not just something that we do. Everyone needs that support. Everyone has the same, everyone wants to write a happy ending and read a happy ending, who –

  Sarah: Yep.

  Alyssa: – like with these romance authors, so who is doing it or what color they are or what religion they are doesn’t change –

  Sarah: Nnnope.

  Alyssa: – the, the basic idea of romance. So that’s why I, like, to me, I just kind of see it as, like, I know I’m like, well, do we really need to talk about this? I mean, we do need to talk about it because it’s a problem, but the bottom line for me is like, come on –

  [Laughter]

  Alyssa: – like, get with the program.

  Sarah: [Laughs]

  Alyssa: Like, it’s not, it’s not like we’re, like, being like, you must eat Brussels sprouts if you hate Brussels sprouts. Like, I like Brussels sprouts, but you know, I don’t, Brussels sprouts are cool right now anyway, but – [laughs] – you know, it’s not changing the format, it’s not saying, oh, now the books are not going to have happy endings. Like, it’s –

  Sarah: No, it’s, it’s not changing the core expectation.

  Alyssa: No, not at all. So –

  Sarah: I, I, I question –

  Alyssa: – I think it’s just inevitable.

  Sarah: I think you’re right, and I, and I question, how is it that so many people have arrived at a place where they fear the unfamiliar and they reject the unfamiliar? Like, there are –

  Alyssa: It –

  Sarah: – isn’t, doesn’t that seem odd? Like, why is it, how is it that this many people have arrived at a point where they are so ferociously rejecting of the unfamiliar? Like –

  Alyssa: Yeah, and I think it’s, for me, I see, I do see it as a kind of, I see it as a kind of, like, form of hysteria.

  Sarah: Institutional racism?

  Alyssa: Ins-, I, ins-, institutional racism, but also kind of like societal mass delusion, because, like, for example, I don’t know if you remember the Sony, the Sony email hacks where someone hacked all the email –

  Sarah: Yes, yes, I do.

  Alyssa: – and the emails were released, and, like, you would see these Hollywood producers just saying things that make, do not match with reality at all. Like, they would say things like, oh, there are no Asian movie stars, which is ridiculous –

  Sarah: Ugh!

  Alyssa: – and when you think about the sheer number, and globally, of Asian people, like, just kind of alone, like saying there are no Asian –

  Sarah: [Laughs] An enormous number of people just went, what?

  Alyssa: Yeah. First of all, there are no, no Asian movie stars. Okay, there are many people who beg to differ with that, and also –

  Sarah: Jackie Chan would like a word with all of you.

  Alyssa: Yeah! [Laughs] Yeah. There are just, like, so many. The film industry is huge there, and it’s just, like, a form of, like, you’re just saying this, and because you’re saying it, you’re thinking that that makes it right. Like –

  Sarah: [Laughs] Don’t believe everything you think!

  Alyssa: [Laughs] And the same thing with, like, you know, African-American leads in a film, and it’s like, they’ll be, oh, well, the movies don’t do well internationally, and then you go and look at the international figures for movies like Fast & Furious or Denzel Washington movies, even movies that do really crappy in the U.S. do amazing overseas. So it’s just like these weird, it’s like, we have these ideas, these ideas that, you know, popped up, I don’t know, in the 1920s, 1930s, and not, and we’re just going to stick with these ideas, even though there’s glaring evidence to the contrary, and you know, it’s the same thing with female directors. Like, oh, we can’t have female directors, there aren’t any female directors, or, you know, we couldn’t find anyone for the project and things like that. It’s just like this, these preset ideas, and I think, I’m talking about Hollywood, but I think there are similar problems in publishing where there are just these preset ideas of, oh, well, you know, these books don’t sell well, and then it, it’s like, is the book not selling well, or is not being marketed well? Like, people, like, you know, I think –

  Sarah: Oh, yes.

  Alyssa: – I don’t think you need to make huge differences, but sometimes you do need to consider other audiences, and this is where I think, too, where also having more people of color, people of different religions and ethnicities behind the scenes in publishing, as editors, as agents –

  Sarah: Mm-hmm.

  Alyssa: – and I think, honestly, more predominantly, the marketing and sales department – [laughs] – because sometimes people, like, you see certain things, and it just seems like people don’t, they think this is some huge scary thing. They’re like, oh, no, we couldn’t sell that, we couldn’t sell that, and it’s like, and then you see people go and self-publish their books and make millions and millions of dollars, and I know those are two different things, but – self-publishing and traditional publishing – but I think a lot of the problem is that marketing just has a skewed idea of who reads certain books, who doesn’t read certain books, and how to market to certain groups. Like, I mentioned this at the RWA panel I did over the summer, but, like, you know, if you want African-American readers, you don’t have to make, like, a rap album about your product to –

  [Laughter]

  Alyssa: – sell – like, it’s, you know, it’s just like these weird, like, okay. I see, I guess, I see what you were trying to do, but, you know, like, why not just market that normally and see what happens, or maybe try outside channels, but, like, the first thing is, like, black people, uh, rap, yeah, they like rap. Like, and then it’s just like, let’s make a, a rap album about Game of Thrones. Like, and then like –

  Sarah: Ohhh.

  Alyssa: – and they, like, the sub-layer to that is, like, the people who did that, for example, didn’t realize that there is already a huge number of black people watching Game of Thrones who watch it every week, who tweet about it every week, who, you know – so it’s just, like, things like that. Like, where are you looking to get your stats about who buys what, who reads what, who watches what –

  Sarah: Mm-hmm.

  Alyssa: – because if you’re not looking in the right place, or if you’re going by preconceived notions, then you’re, in this day and age, you are just going to be wrong. [Laughs]

  Sarah: Yeah.

  Alyssa: So, yeah. I think –

  Sarah: One of the things I, I have been thinking a lot about lately, especially because it was, you know, it was just the holidays, and a lot of people have miserable family experiences at the holidays, and I think a lot of that tension comes from the huge distance between the reality of your family and the expectation of what family should be doing and what family should feel on, on a, on a holiday like Christmas or whatever, so you should all be in your pajamas having a wonderful morning, and everyone loves everyone, and you’re all warm, and all the, none of the nightgowns that you got have scratchy tags, and everyone’s comfortable, and everyone gets exactly what they want, and it’s this sort of homogenized, beautiful, comforting reality that does not exist, and the distance between your actual family with actual human problems and actual tensions and, you know, people who you really don’t like, despite sharing a lot of genetic code with them?

  Alyssa: [Laughs]

  Sarah: The distance between that and this idealized concept is very painful, the larger the distance it is, and what I find so baffling is that same distance appearing in other places. So you have the actual reality of what the romance-reading community just looks like – we are a very diverse and intelligent group of mostly women, but we’re not all white –

  Alyssa: Yeah.

  Sarah: – we’re not all straight, we’re not all Christian. We are super different from, from each other in a lot of ways, yet we all love these books. Yet the idea of who is the readership doesn’t match the reality, and so this idea –

  Alyssa: Yeah.

  Sarah: – the distance between the idea and the reality gets bigger and bigger or smaller, depending on who’s operating the marketing machine.

  Alyssa: Yep.

  Sarah: It, it, that tension increases. What I, what I love is the fact that at any time, I can sign on and talk to people directly and say, well, what are you actually looking for? Because I get pitch emails all the time that I am completely confused by. Readers who are desperate for this book to come out or for this movie to come out are seeking the next great zombie love story, and I’m like, really? I have not met these people!

  Alyssa: [Laughs]

  Sarah: Who are these people you are talking about? ‘Cause I mean, I understand everyone wanting to go talk about The Force Awakens; I totally get that! There’s a lot to talk about! But, like, I do not see this roving horde of readers clamoring for the next great, you know, zombie romance. I, I don’t see them. Where are they? Are, are they there, or do you think they’re there? Or is it, like, a reality that you would like to manufacture for – like, what is this? So the distance between the idea and the reality gets either closer together or farther apart, depending on what, you know, what day it is. [Laughs]

  Alyssa: Yeah, and it’s like, it’s like, I feel like just, there are so many times when the general societal algorithm kind of just falls back on a default, and, like, one thing that’s interesting – so, have you seen the movie Beyond the Lights?

  Sarah: Beyond the Lights.

  Alyssa: It’s a romance movie that came out in 2014. It’s –

  Sarah: I don’t think I have, but I, I have younger kids, so my movie-going is extremely animated. Let me look this up –

  Alyssa: [Laughs] Okay, so this is not –

  Sarah: – ‘cause it might be on my queue.

  Alyssa: It’s on Netflix, and the director’s Gina Prince-Blythewood. She also did Love & Basketball, and so, okay. So, I –

  Sarah: Oh, it’s Gugu Muthab – how do you say her last name? Mbatha-Raw?

  Alyssa: Mbatha-Raw.

  Sarah: Thank you! ‘Cause I have only read it and never said it, but I – ooh! I have this on my queue, I know exactly – okay, all of a sudden, my catnip activation has occurred. Yes! Tell me more!

  Alyssa: Okay. And so, one of my 2016 resolutions is to make everyone watch Beyond the Lights, but it’s also, to me, an example of the weirdness that happens when people see, when marketers and people in charge see a movie or a book or whatever with a, a person of color or people of color as the leads and, so this is basically a straight romance movie. Like – and I’m, and it’s funny, it’s sad, it’s so romantic, and I just watched it a few weeks ago, and I was like – and I had seen people talking about it and saying how great it, saying that it was great. When I saw it marketed, it was, like, kind of weird. Like, I couldn’t tell if it was, like, a mother-daughter –

  Sarah: [Laughs]

  Alyssa: – family relationship movie, if it was a romance or, like – it’s set in the music industry. Like, I couldn’t really tell what it was about, but it’s like, it’s straight romance, and it’s amazing. You, you need to watch it.

  Sarah: All right. I, I’m on this.

  Alyssa: Anyone listening to this, you need to watch it. But also, first it’s on Netflix – [laughs] – and it’s a romance, but yet, when you finish watching it, or if you watch it, and the movies that are recommended to you, it’s not, it’s not recommending, like, you know, While You Were Sleeping or other popular romance movies –

  Sarah: Right.

  Alyssa: – it’s recommending, like, Tyler Perry’s Madea or, like, you know, whatever –

  Sarah: Ohhh-kay.

  Alyssa: – other black movies, so it’s like, again, miscategorization. Just because the people in the movie are black and the director is black, it gets shuffled off into this other category when someone who loves While You Were Sleeping or someone who loves, you know, other great rom-com –

  Sarah: Would love this movie.

  Alyssa: – or just great romantic movie would love this movie, but that’s not what’s getting recommended to them when they finish watching those movies. So it’s, like, I just feel like it’s a perfect example of, like, if this movie had been marketed well, like, I feel like everyone who loves romance should at least give this movie a try. We all have different tastes, maybe you won’t like it, but it, I feel like it’s a movie that, like, I and, I was speaking on Twitter and Emma Barry said something like, you know, I couldn’t believe that everyone in Romancelandia wasn’t talking about it, and it’s like, it’s true! This is something that I think every-, most romance readers would love this movie, but no one played on that marketing device, no one played, looked for the romance angle because it was presented, like, you know, it was like, oh, this is just, like, a black movie. It’s not, like, it wasn’t seen, the nuance of it’s a romance movie and you’re really going to love it and – like, that wasn’t hyped up how it is. I mean romances in general in film are, you know, currently there haven’t been any great rom-coms, to my knowledge.

  Sarah: No, I was –

  Alyssa: [Laughs] I, I don’t –

  Sarah: – I was, I was talking at length with, with Liza Palmer, I was talking with Liza Palmer about that because she now works for Buzzfeed, because they are getting into scripted content –

  Alyssa: Yeah!

  Sarah: – and she is a huge rom-com fan, and there have not been good ones for years. And I’m, and I’m laughing listening to you talk about how, you know, the minute you watch this movie all of your Netflix recommendations are Tyler Perry movies. It makes think of Rebekah Weatherspoon saying, I do not write in the genre Black Lady. It’s not a genre!

  Alyssa: [Laughs] Yeah!

  Sarah: This is not a genre either. Oh, my gosh, I really want to see this, like, right now!

  Alyssa: Oh, yes, and it – yeah, Rebekah Weatherspoon also loved this movie. We have squeed about this movie repeatedly together. But, yeah, it’s just a thing of like –

  Sarah: How did I miss this? When did this come out?

  Alyssa: Exactly!

  Sarah: Oh, 2014! I was very firmly in animated movie land. [Laughs] If, if it has actual humans in it, it’s really unlikely that I’ve seen it, ‘cause when we, ‘cause you know, going to see the movies with, like, four total humans is expensive! So when we do it, we’re going with, you know –

  Alyssa: Yeah. I don’t think the –

  Sarah: Pixar, DreamWorks, Disney.

  Alyssa: – I don’t think the kids would be too into this movie?

  Sarah: Nah, this is totally all for me.

  Alyssa: They would like the dog. [Laughs]

  Sarah: All for me. This is my movie. Go to bed, everybody. Actually, you know what, my husband is out tonight, and my kids are going to bed early, and I have a date. With this movie. Yay!

  Alyssa: I highly recommend. I am happy to hear that.

  Sarah: Thank you!

  Alyssa: Because – [laughs] – because I’m, it’s just, for me, it’s just, like, the most blinding that I can think of currently example of, like, when sales people and marketing people who have one idea of who wants to watch something, you know, who to market to, how to market to people –

  Sarah: Mm-hmm.

  Alyssa: – like, you know, when – and that’s a problem overall, I think, but I think especially when it comes to things that are culturally diverse and that are just seen as outside the box, you know, and when things are called outside the box, I don’t what that’s saying the box is. The white box, I guess? I don’t know. I’ve seen, you know, outside the box seen to describe things that aren’t seen as saleable, and then it’s like, well, why isn’t it seen as saleable? And then, you know, that gets all vague and no one really wants to talk about that aspect. But I think that, you know, besides wanting to push this movie and people to watch it, I just think it’s a good example of how something that is blatantly one thing can kind of get lost in the fray because it’s, people, marketers get confused just by the fact that there are people of color in it, and then it’s like, wait! Like, the first thing that should have come to mind was romance, but then it was like, no, well, maybe this is a movie about, you know, this sad thing, this sad mother-daughter relationship or something like that.

  Sarah: Thank you for – [laughs] – recommending this movie. I have now gone down the rabbit hole, and I’m like, I’m going to watch this.

  Alyssa: [Laughs]

  Sarah: And I’m going to watch this movie, I’m going to watch this one over here, and I’m going to watch this movie too. This is awesome. Thank you! I really appreciate this recommendation, ‘cause I don’t know how I missed this. What the hell? Dude. I am squarely in this demographic.

  [music]

  Sarah: And that is all for this week’s episode. I want to thank Alyssa Cole and all of the birds in Martinique for their guest appearance. If you would like to find some of the books or the movie that we discussed, the show notes at smartbitchestrashybooks.com will have links to all of the things.

  If you have ideas or suggestions or you want to ask a question, you can email us at sbjpodcast@gmail.com, or you can leave us a message at our Google voice number, 1-201-371-DBSA. Please leave us your name and where you’re calling from, because some of you are so awesome as to leave nice, cool messages. I want to do a voicemail episode very soon, so please call! Ask questions. Ask nosy questions! Do whatever you want to do! It’s cool!

  The music this week was provided by Sassy Outwater. This is Deviations Project, which features producer Dave Williams and violinist Oliver Lewis. This album is Ivory Bow, and this particular track is called “Celtic Frock.”

  The podcast this week was sponsored by Renee Ahdieh, author of The Wrath & the Dawn, published by G. P. Putnam’s Sons Books for Young Readers, available in print and eBook. Each dawn brings death, but can love change the story? This intoxicating retelling of A Thousand and One Nights will leave you begging for book two, The Rose & the Dagger, coming Summer 2016.

  The podcast transcript this month is sponsored by Kensington, publishers of Into the Fury by New York Times bestselling author Kat Martin. The first in a new series, Kat Martin is back with her signature spine-tingling suspense and unforgettable action as she introduces readers to the elite team of private investigators at BOSS INC., who are both hard-hitting and hot stuff. This book is on sale January 29th, 2016.

  Future podcasts will include me talking about romances, ‘cause that’s how we roll here. I have interviews planned, but if you have ideas or suggestions, please contact us, because I love to hear from you, and whether or not you’re training for a triathlon or running on the treadmill or walking the dogs or just hanging out, we wish you the very best of reading. Have a great weekend.

  [energetic music]

  This podcast transcript was handcrafted with meticulous skill by Garlic Knitter. Many thanks.

• Vulture - http://www.vulture.com/2018/02/alyssa-cole-on-why-her-romance-novels-are-always-political.html

  February 27, 2018 5:50 pm
  Alyssa Cole on Why Her Romance Novels Are Always Political
  By
  Jaime Green
  Share Share Tweet Pin It

  Alyssa Cole. Photo: Courtesy of Harper Collins
  The first two books in Alyssa Cole’s Loyal League series were two of the biggest things in romance in 2017. The heroines of both books are free black women in the Civil War, working in the South against the Confederacy. In those books, Cole shined a new light on what we may think of as a well-known period of American history, complicating simple narratives with stories inspired by true events, giving unsung heroines their hard-won happy endings. In all of her work, Cole uses romance to engage with the real world, proposing hope amid turmoil. Now, she’s breaking into rom-com territory with a new series, Reluctant Royals, which kicks off with A Princess in Theory. Here, our heroine is Ledi, an epidemiology Ph.D. student who finds herself inundated with spam mail telling her she’s the long-lost betrothed of Prince Thabiso of Thesolo. Except it turns out not to be spam. Ledi’s life is turned upside down and she’s swept off her feet, but as much as it’s secret-royalty wish fulfillment, nothing about Ledi’s story erases the hard truths of her real life. With her new book out today, we spoke to Cole about keeping her work political, princess stories, and parallels in her new novel to Black Panther’s Wakanda.

  Most romance authors pick one subgenre or time period for their work, but you’ve run the gamut from postapocalyptic sci-fi to historical fiction, and now a contemporary series. What drives that exploration?
  I’m interested in a lot of different things, and what what I’m interested in affects what I decide to write about. There is so much to draw from across the history of humankind — staying in one time period, or even one genre, [would be] boring. Focus is not my strongest point, so if I’m writing about something I really need to be interested in the subject.

  Do you see your work as having through lines that aren’t defined by genre?
  Obviously every book is about something different, but there’s always generally something political, <>

  In the author’s note at the end of An Extraordinary Union, you write that you always thought you would never write about the Civil War. Once you had braved that subject, which had been this big terrifying thing, how did you figure out what would be next?
  Within a relatively short period of time from when I started becoming open to the idea of writing, I thought, Okay maybe I will try writing historical fiction, because there were things that I wanted to explore that not many authors in the mainstream — [beyond] Beverly Jenkins — were really writing about. There are just so many different facets of history that would be interesting. It was a slippery slope. It was like, Oh, maybe I can do 1960s; oh, maybe I can do Revolutionary War, and then kind of like slid right into, Well, okay, we can do the Civil War now.

  Some ideas that have been germinating for a long time. With the princess books — I grew up a tomboy, but I still loved fairy tales and I still always wanted to see princesses that looked like me. Someone [recently] shared a screenshot from Let It Shine, which was [my 1960s] activism romance, and there’s a part where the heroine of that book says, “Well, black girls can’t be princesses.” Sometimes it’s like one book is answering, or is an echo of, something I thought about in a previous book.

  Have recent politics, coupled with the intensity of writing about the Civil War, led you to want to write something that had a lighter tone?
  That was a huge part of it. I love history, but [in research] you come across things that are so horrible, because humans can be extremely terrible. At a certain point it’s like, Okay, I would like to take a break from like the horribleness of man’s inhumanity to man and just write about princesses! [In A Princess in Theory] there are some allusions to modern politics, and their world isn’t perfect or anything, but it’s definitely much lighter than the midst of the American Civil War.

  Ledi has a very difficult life in New York, but roughly the second half of the book takes place in Thesolo, a small and not-well-known African kingdom that for the most part is peaceful and very wealthy and technologically advanced. This is probably an artifact of timing, but as I was reading I kept thinking of Wakanda.
  Yeah, the timing is a coincidence. I based a lot of the culture of the kingdom on the real African kingdom of Lesotho, but I am not African, I’m not from Lesotho or from any region nearby. I didn’t want to just take someone’s country and make it into this magical place. So I researched a lot of that culture [but] there are also aspects of other cultures from different African countries.

  One of the things that I was thinking about was, with smaller countries it can be much easier to deploy different forms of technology and see how they play out. They can often be staging grounds. So things like the heated sidewalks [in a mountain town] came from trying to figure out if you had a place was small enough and wealthy enough and actually cared about its inhabitants, the environment, and things things like that, then how could this play out?

  With all of the happy endings and wish-fulfillment elements in a romance, one of the things that grabs my heart the hardest is what you just said: the idea of a government that really cares about the people.
  Part of that is my own inner wish fulfillment! But I also didn’t want [Prince] Thabiso to just be a playboy. I didn’t want to write someone who had to learn to care about people. In a kingdom this small and community-oriented, if people were starving, or anything like that, he wouldn’t be able to avoid it. So I wanted someone who is actually involved in the kingdom and wasn’t just cloistered away. And because of that, he felt a connection to [his] people and was trying to think of the best for them, even if he was occasionally a jerk in other areas.

  Ledi is such an interesting character. I know your historical characters are often based on real people. Where did her story come from?
  I made her a scientist because I worked in science — I was not a scientist, I worked at a science journal. So I was interested in science and in black women working in the field.

  Sometimes you see those things where people are like, Don’t be a princess, be a scientist or Don’t give her a princess wand, give her a beaker, where it’s this dismissive attitude about princesses and like, I’m not going to launch like the princess defense squad, I obviously understand where it comes from. Girls were told they could only be princesses and they weren’t told to aspire to the same things that young boys were. But something that gets lost in that backlash is that not everyone was told they could be a princess. A very specific subset of women were generally the people that were thought of when the word “princess” was used. So I thought that it would be cool to have someone who works in science, is street smart and capable and doesn’t actually need a prince to sweep her off her feet.

  What do you want your readers to come away with after they’ve read your books?
  It’s hard to describe the feeling when you finish a good romance — you<< feel full of hope and that the world is full of possibilities>>. Even if everything felt really shitty when you first picked up the book, you’re like, Okay, the world itself does not change, but by reading this book I feel somewhat better. I feel better in myself and I feel like there is something good in the world. It can be like medicine for your spirit.

  Side benefits: I would hope that if they’re reading historicals maybe they learned some random history minutiae that they didn’t know about and found interesting. But in general, I just want people to get a good, satisfied feeling. I guess feeling, and then learning, if they feel like learning, but the learning part is not required at all.

  This interview has been edited and condensed.

• Shondaland - https://www.shondaland.com/inspire/books/a13511524/alyssa-cole-romance-interview/

  Alyssa Cole On the Magic of Writing Romance
  "The Confederacy f*cking lost. They didn't have the range."

  BY KENDRA JAMES
  NOV 27, 2017
  KENSINGTON BOOKS
  Author (and Shondaland.com contributor!) Alyssa Cole is living the dream. She splits her time between the East Coast and the Caribbean, lives with a loving partner, and gets paid to let her imagination run wild.

  As the author of multiple historical and contemporary romance novels, Cole has always featured protagonists spanning a wide range of backgrounds and experiences. Whether she’s writing Scottish knights, Indian demi-gods, or American civil rights activists, Cole’s characters shine with unique voices and deep humanity. The first book of her newest series, "The Loyal League," is no exception: Released earlier this year, "An Extraordinary Union" follows the story of Elle Burns, a former slave with an eidetic memory who finds herself working as a spy for the Union Army. This assignment means allowing herself to be sold back into slavery, an obviously risky move for a freed woman. To make matters even more complicated, on her mission, she meets and falls in love with fellow undercover agent, Malcolm McCall — a white man.

  Successfully navigating the challenges of writing an interracial romance set during the Civil War is difficult enough to do once, but to pull it off twice is truly impressive. And yet Cole has managed to do just that with her second book in the series, "A Hope Divided," which features a second McCall brother and another freed woman, Marlie Lynch, on sale November 28.

  Between promoting her newest release, writing her next one, and penning recommendations for Shondaland.com, Cole made time to talk with us over Gchat (the future is now) about "A Hope Divided," the book’s surprising relevance in 2017, and her overall love of the romance genre.

  Alyssa Cole
  "A Hope Divided," "Be Not Afraid" (a Revolutionary War romance novel, and "An Extraordinary Union."
  KENSINGTON BOOKS / ALYSSA COLE
  Shondaland: What do you think makes a romance novel hero/ine sexy?

  Alyssa Cole: I personally love really competent hero/heroines — there’s even a name for it: competency porn! There’s just something really sexy about characters that really know what they’re doing, and are just plain good at it. Emma Barry and Genevieve Turner’s space race-set "Earth Bound" is a great example of this, with a lead engineer hero and a computer scientist heroine who’s kept from living up to her potential. This is also something I’ve found in most of Farrah Rochon’s books, like her latest "Trust Me," about a deputy mayor and a journalist investigating corruption. Also, basically any Courtney Milan book, but you can start with her "Brothers Sinister" series. (Note: if you learn one thing about romance readers it should be this: We LIVE to give recommendations!)

  The heroine has to have agency, just as she would in any other setting, in order for it the story to really work.

  I also love super supportive heroes. I mean, the heroine/partner should be supportive, too! But let’s be real: In a society where women are expected to put their dreams aside and take on the bulk of the emotional workload, I love relationships in which, whatever the conflict, the hero has the heroine’s back. In Beverly Jenkins’ "Breathless," the hero supports the heroine in her dream to open her own bookkeeping business in a time when black women weren’t expected to do such things. Supportive men can be coded as "weak" in society at large, so I particularly love books that subvert this idea and focus on what romance is really about: two (or more) people learning that they are particularly suited to facing their personal and/or societal obstacles together.

  SL: To each their own, but what do you think makes a romance novel great?

  AC: Oh, so many things! It can honestly depend on your mood. But the common things in the romances I enjoy the most are:

  1. Great world building, where the setting of the story is integrally tied to the plot and characterization and it all combines to suck you in and make it impossible to put the book down.

  2. Real emotional depth, which raises the stakes in a way that plot cannot. It’s one thing for you to want a character to survive, it’s another for you to want them to live. To be so invested in the outcome of their emotional arc that you’re afraid that something will go wrong and their possibility of happiness will be taken away — even though you know that because it’s a romance, there is the guarantee of an HEA (Happily Ever After)! (That’s the thing with romance being "formulaic" — yes, there has to be a happy ending, but you damn well better make the reader worried that there won’t be and the ways in which an author can do that are infinite.) Alisha Rai’s "Forbidden Hearts" series is a great example of this.

  3. Voice. A book where the character has a really unique voice that draws you in and is super engaging always captures my interest and draws me even further into the story. Rebekah Weatherspoon’s “Haven” is great for voice.

  SL: Why romance? What about the genre drew you in and made you want to play in the sandbox?

  I can’t stand the Sally Hemings/Thomas Jefferson template for historical interracial relationships.

  AC: The HEA, for sure. I tended to write very dark stuff, even as a kid — I mean, my favorite author was Stephen King. But even in a horror novel, the book doesn’t generally end with the character you’re rooting for losing to the forces of darkness, right? Romance works the same way. You know that even if the characters go through hell, in the end their resourcefulness and the partnership(s) they’ve formed will see them through to that HEA, and as a bonus there will hopefully be great banter and sex along the way.

  And, this might seem a little sappy, but: I think romance novels are magic. I deal with depression and anxiety, and books of all kinds have always been self-care for me in periods when things were rough. I can’t count the number of times I’ve been in a slump, and picked up a romance because I had to do something other than stare at the ceiling, and then found myself laughing, and crying, and feeling. That’s <> it tells you that <> no matter what ups and downs you go through in life, that <> That those aren’t things you should have to compromise on. So why do I write romance? I guess because it makes me feel like a wizard.

  That’s the magic of romance: it tells you that no matter how terrible and broken and awful you feel, that you deserve love and hope and happiness.

  SL: How do you navigate the power dynamics that come with both race and gender when you're writing an interracial relationship in the Civil War era?

  AC: Whether I’m writing SFF [Editor's note: Science Fiction and Fantasy], contemporary, or historical, I’m always really aware of power dynamics because the majority of my characters are from traditionally marginalized groups. Even if there are no white people in the book at all, that doesn’t mean that everyone is on the same playing field. Obviously, in a Civil War-set book, this becomes even more important because there is an extremely fucked up power differential just by virtue of slavery.

  When I was first shopping around "An Extraordinary Union," I had a few agents who said they loved it but wanted me to make Malcolm, the hero, "darker, grittier, and more alpha," which was just a huge NO for me. The book is set in a world where white people could own black people. Having a white hero who was possessive or overbearing is the last thing this kind of story needs — I mean, that’s the villain in this setting. I tried to thread that needle very carefully — in order for the romance to work, the hero had to be aware of his societal power advantage over the heroine, or become aware of it, and actively be working to mitigate that within their relationship and in the world they’re living in. I can’t stand the Sally Hemmings/Thomas Jefferson template for historical interracial relationships (or people’s weird obsession with it), so I always try to keep that in mind as what I’m trying not to do. The heroine has to have agency, just as she would in any other setting, in order for it the story to really work.

  ALYSSA COLE
  SL: There's a line very early on in "A Hope Divided" where your heroine, Marlie, says to her eventual love interest, Ewan, "Some arguments are not worth engaging. If you tried arguing the validity of the Confederacy, this conversation would be over." I happened to read the book during the week after the Charlottesville rally. With the tone of the national conversation around the removal of Confederate statues and about Confederate sympathizers at that time, that line really hit home. It takes a while to write a book — did you expect this topic to be this relevant when you were researching and writing these characters?

  AC: Oh boy. I expected maybe slight relevancy, not white-supremacists-marching-with-torches relevancy. Not the-Klan-shall-rise-again relevancy. This has actually been really disheartening — seeing the worst aspects of American history that I’ve written about, sure that they were firmly in the past, start to zombie shuffle back onto the scene to this degree.

  So on November 1 of last year, "An Extraordinary Union"’s release was a few months away, and I released a book set in 1917 Harlem. "Let Us Dream" has a black cabaret owner heroine working for women’s right to vote and a South Asian Muslim lascar who jumps ship in NYC and is screwed by the Anti-Asian Immigration Act. It, of course, has a hopeful ending. Then November 9 happens. And then the Muslim ban happens. And white supremacists start stepping out without hoods, and dog whistles start turning into regular whistles. And for a while there I just felt completely paralyzed. I felt this weird guilt, like I had betrayed my characters.

  Why do I write romance? I guess because it makes me feel like a wizard.

  No, I don’t think they’re real, but in a way these characters are little slivers of my ideals. Hope. Justice. Equality. It’s like putting your intentions out into the universe. And then November 9 came along and crushed all those ideals and intentions into dust. And all the nightmarish things I’d been reading about in my research, that never really stopped, were slowly becoming part of the status quo. It’s frightening. But even though I can be pessimistic, I’m trying to look at the hopeful things I’ve come across in history. And you know what? The Confederacy lost. They fucking lost. They didn’t lose by accident. They lost because they were, as a government, inept and overconfident and they didn’t have the range.

  The Anti-Asian Immigration Act was eventually overturned. The Civil Rights Act was passed. So when I start seeing only the negative parallels with the past, I try to remember the positive ones. And I try <> The fight shouldn’t be this hard or this long, but I feel like for all the Ls we’ve taken, we’ve had some damn good wins and will have more.

  SL: A recent "review" of romance novels in the New York Times shows that some people clearly still have the idea that romance novels aren't a serious genre of books read by serious people. On the contrary many books in the genre, yours in "The Loyal League" included, are incredibly detailed and meticulously written. What type of reader is "The Loyal League" actually for?

  Romance gets the shit end of this stick every time for several reasons, mostly because it’s by women.

  AC: Well, first, I think the idea of a "serious genre" is pretty laughable: one of the most talked about "serious" books of recent times had a hero whose wife made him sit on the toilet to pee, but because the author is a SWM (serious white male), I’m supposed to read that and try to impart some deeper meaning to it instead of laughing my ass off. I think the biggest problem with the framework of literary criticism as it relates to genre writing is that there’s this idea that "seriousness" or worth can be assigned to a book by where it’s located in the bookstore, which is ridiculous. Romance gets the shit end of this stick every time for several reasons, mostly because it’s by women, marketed to women — notice that formerly male-dominated genres have become more accepted by the literary establishment over the years. Also, romance is coded as emotional, and of course, emotions aren’t serious. They’re only the framework of every social interaction we have as humans — totally silly and unserious!

  There are some people, even within the genre, who believe that romance novels are inherently less important than books in the running for the Great American Novel (whatever that means). I can’t get down with that. I’ve read so many amazing, compelling, well-written romances, and thinking otherwise is a form of literary ignorance, which is pretty ironic given that it’s usually deployed to make a group of readers and authors feel like they don’t understand good literature.

  "The Loyal League" was written with romance readers in mind, but anyone can be a romance reader if they pick up the book! One of the greatest surprises of being published is hearing from people who don’t fit my "marketing demographic" who’ve really enjoyed my work.

  "A Hope Divided" will be available from Kensington Books on November 28.

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Print Marked Items
Cole, Alyssa: A PRINCESS IN THEORY
Kirkus Reviews.
(Feb. 1, 2018):
COPYRIGHT 2018 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
Full Text:
Cole, Alyssa A PRINCESS IN THEORY Avon/HarperCollins (Adult Fiction) $7.99 2, 27 ISBN: 978-0-06-
268554-4
Cole makes her Avon debut with a romance that draws on familiar genre tropes only to upend them.
An arranged marriage, a mistaken identity, and a handsome prince from an imaginary country are just a few
common tropes in the first book in Cole's (An Extraordinary Union, 2017, etc.) Reluctant Royals series. But
with ironic nods to Disney and Mills & Boon, Cole gives 21st-century twists. Naledi, a graduate student in
epidemiology, juggles lab work, a waitressing job, and a drunken mess of a best friend. Being raised in
foster homes has given her the toughness she needs to succeed as a black woman in an often hostile world
but also a vulnerability. Naledi hasn't been lucky in love, and she wonders whether she's "like a faulty piece
of Velcro; people tried to stick to her, but there was something intrinsically wrong in her design." When she
gets an email addressing her as the long-lost betrothed of Prince Thabiso of the small (fictional) African
country of Thesolo, Naledi hits delete. Little does she realize that the incompetent new waiter she's been
trying to train is, in fact, the "Playboy PanAfrique," come to New York to check out his intended. Thabiso
insinuates himself into Naledi's life, and they become friends and, soon after, lovers. Thabiso's big ego and
sense of entitlement are tempered by his exposure to working-class realities, while Naledi discovers how
wonderful it can be to open up and connect. Of course, catastrophe is just around the corner, and its
resolution comes only after they journey to Thesolo, where Naledi can discover her roots while at the same
time working to stop an outbreak of a mysterious disease.
A <> between a suave African prince and a nerdy epidemiology student.
Source Citation (MLA 8th
Edition)
"Cole, Alyssa: A PRINCESS IN THEORY." Kirkus Reviews, 1 Feb. 2018. General OneFile,
http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A525461549/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=e910b8ae.
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A Hope Divided
Kristina Giovanni
Booklist.
114.4 (Oct. 15, 2017): p30.
COPYRIGHT 2017 American Library Association
http://www.ala.org/aboutala/offices/publishing/booklist/
Full Text:
* A Hope Divided. By Alyssa Cole. Dec. 2017.320p. Kensington, paper, $15 (9781496707468).
Marlie Lynch is more privileged than most, but her free papers and her family's protection offer little
comfort when Confederate soldiers arrive and threaten her already-limited liberty. But in the quiet of her
rooms, she is free to experiment and tinker with her herbs and medicinal concoctions, which help heal the
wounds of soldiers, neighbors, and slaves alike. She is well respected in her small community for her work
and for her name, and that is why no one suspects that she may be harboring a fugitive in the attic. Ewan
McCall is used to silence and solitude. As a Union officer who has spent several years in Confederate
prisons, he has acclimated to being alone with a book or just his thoughts. Yet while hidden in Marlies
secret room, all his thoughts are fixated on the beautiful and brilliant woman on the other side of the door.
<> Thoughtfully portrayed characters with deep minds and passionate hearts make this second novel in
Cole's Loyal League series, following An Extraordinary Union (2017), sparkle. Highly recommended for
lovers of historical romance.--Kristina Giovanni
Source Citation (MLA 8th
Edition)
Giovanni, Kristina. "A Hope Divided." Booklist, 15 Oct. 2017, p. 30. General OneFile,
http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A512776123/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=d921f287.
Accessed 17 May 2018.
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Cole, Alyssa: A HOPE DIVIDED
Kirkus Reviews.
(Oct. 15, 2017):
COPYRIGHT 2017 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
Full Text:
Cole, Alyssa A HOPE DIVIDED Kensington (Adult Fiction) $15.00 11, 28 ISBN: 978-1-4967-0746-8
A self-taught scientist spying for the North rescues a Union soldier in the Confederate state of North
Carolina.
Marlie Lynch is the free-born daughter of a formerly enslaved medicine woman and a mysterious white
father. Even though her connection to the landowning white Lynch family is not openly acknowledged,
Marlie lives in their house and dines with the family. This nominal protection allows her to take risks for her
cause. On the surface, she's collecting the herbs and roots that go into her medicinal decoctions. But she's
also helping those less fortunate get to safety through the Underground Railroad and carrying books, food,
and information in and out of the local prison camp. There, she meets the imprisoned soldier Ewan McCall.
But Ewan is more than just another redheaded white boy fighting for the Union. He's a skilled interrogator
and is tormented by the things he's done to extract information from captured Rebels. When Ewan seizes an
opportunity to escape the prison, Marlie shelters him at the Lynch estate. But before long, the hatred and
racism that surround Marlie's home invade her very family, and she flees with Ewan through the Carolina
woods. The second book in Cole's Loyal League series (An Extraordinary Union, 2017) follows much the
same pattern as the first. Again, Cole's heroine is gorgeously portrayed and powerful enough that readers
will worship at her feet just as Ewan does. But if this book shows that Cole is settling into a pattern, readers
won't want her to break the mold on book No. 3. <> This book is fantastic.
As the war closes in around them, the line blurs between who is the rescuer and who is the rescued.
Source Citation (MLA 8th
Edition)
"Cole, Alyssa: A HOPE DIVIDED." Kirkus Reviews, 15 Oct. 2017. General OneFile,
http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A509244175/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=857f7b02.
Accessed 17 May 2018.
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An Extraordinary Union
Kristina Giovanni
Booklist.
113.14 (Mar. 15, 2017): p29.
COPYRIGHT 2017 American Library Association
http://www.ala.org/aboutala/offices/publishing/booklist/
Full Text:
An Extraordinary Union.
By Alyssa Cole.
Apr. 2017.320p. Kensington, paper, $15 (9781496707444).
In the first installment in what should be a spectacular new series, Cole opens her adventurous historical
romance at the beginning of the American Civil War. Elle Burns is not what she seems, which suits her just
fine since she needs to conceal her true identity by staying out of sight and out of mind. Luckily for her, no
one suspects that a mute slave girl on a I Southern estate is really a spy working for the Loyalty League, a
secret society of freed blacks and slaves funneling information to the Union. Her disguise was working
perfectly until a handsome Confederate soldier with a Scottish brogue nearly ruins everything. Malcolm
McCall looks like a "Rebel Hero," but he's really a roguish Pinkerton detective who uses charm to disarm
senators and Southern belles alike. As spy encounters spy, the two must decide if they can trust each other
and if working together is in their best interests, or if their desire to win the war is greater than their
growing desire for one another. Fans of Beverly Jenkins <> in a time of slavery and war. --Kristina Giovanni
Source Citation (MLA 8th
Edition)
Giovanni, Kristina. "An Extraordinary Union." Booklist, 15 Mar. 2017, p. 29. General OneFile,
http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A490998463/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=c7ba96ed.
Accessed 17 May 2018.
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Cole, Alyssa: AN EXTRAORDINARY
UNION
Kirkus Reviews.
(Feb. 1, 2017):
COPYRIGHT 2017 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
Full Text:
Cole, Alyssa AN EXTRAORDINARY UNION Kensington (Adult Fiction) $15.00 3, 28 ISBN: 978-1-
4967-0744-4
A spy posing as a slave in Civil War Virginia risks her own life and the outcome of the war by falling in
love with a fellow spy of another race.After being freed from slavery as a child, Ellen "Elle" Burns has one
purpose. She is "going to help destroy the Confederacy." But to do that, she has to do something she never
imagined possible--pose as an enslaved woman on loan to a family of spoiled whites. Her "masters" are
living the high life in spite of a punishing Union blockade that's causing widespread suffering and starvation
in Richmond, Virginia. Elle's photographic memory makes her extremely valuable to the Loyal League, a
network of black spies working to undermine the Confederacy. But her careful work is thrown into disarray
by the arrival of Malcolm McCall, a detective in the Pinkerton network who is posing as a Confederate
soldier paying social visits to the household where Elle works. Malcolm is a skilled spy and a good person,
but Elle has a hard time bringing herself to trust a glib and charming white man whose job requires him to
be a gifted liar. Little by little Malcolm wins her over, but the painful racial dynamics around them threaten
to poison their relationship. Malcolm must treat Elle as less than human in front of others while convincing
her in private that he values her as highly as any white woman. The first installment in Cole's (Mixed
Signals, 2015, etc.) Loyal League series <> It's both a romance and a spy
novel, with a healthy dose of adventure thrown in, and it offers a nuanced portrayal of Civil War-era racial
politics. Any reader who thinks romance novels are pure fluff will be schooled by Cole's richly drawn
characters, who must overcome generations of trauma in order to let themselves love each other. A
masterful tale that bodes well for future work from Cole.
Source Citation (MLA 8th
Edition)
"Cole, Alyssa: AN EXTRAORDINARY UNION." Kirkus Reviews, 1 Feb. 2017. General OneFile,
http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A479234768/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=bd93e605.
Accessed 17 May 2018.
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Signal Boost
Publishers Weekly.
262.14 (Apr. 6, 2015): p46.
COPYRIGHT 2015 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
Full Text:
Signal Boost
Alyssa Cole. Carina, $3.99 e-book (115p) ISBN 978-1-4268-9988-1
Cole (Radio Silence) embeds a meet-cute between gawky, good-natured, and truly adorable gay 20-
somethings into the poorly constructed postapocalyptic world of her Off the Grid series. A solar flare has
taken out electrical and communications grids worldwide. Jang-wan "John" Seong is hiding out at his
parents' upstate New York home with his brother, Gabriel; their sister, Maggie; Gabriel's girlfriend, Arden;
and the mother and infant they've taken in. After he catches tall, blond astrophysics grad student Mykhail
Shevchenko in their tomato patch, the family offers the stranger wary hospitality, and when he heads to
Burnell University to find a professor who may know more about the solar flare, John joins him, motivated
by a potent combination of attraction to Mykhail and a desire to fix the world. Resource-hoarding bullies,
power-hungry scientists, and racist, abusive soldiers make for flat, uninteresting antagonists, and though the
series will probably continue to explore the setting's mysteries, the fact that this volume ends as soon as the
romantic outcome is assured feels disappointingly abrupt. (May)
Source Citation (MLA 8th
Edition)
"Signal Boost." Publishers Weekly, 6 Apr. 2015, p. 46. General OneFile,
http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A409833272/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=3aac75e6.
Accessed 17 May 2018.
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Cole, Alyssa. Mixed Signals
Melanie C. Duncan
Xpress Reviews.
(Sept. 18, 2015):
COPYRIGHT 2015 Library Journals, LLC
http://www.libraryjournal.com/lj/reviews/xpress/884170-289/xpress_reviews-first_look_at_new.html.csp
Full Text:
Cole, Alyssa. Mixed Signals. Carina: Harlequin. (Off the Grid, Bk. 3). Oct. 2015. 207p. ebk. ISBN
9781459290181. $3.99. POSTAPOCALYPTIC, NEW ADULT, MULTICULTURAL ROMANCE
In the four years post-Flare, the destruction of all technology, civilization is creeping out of the dark and 20-
year-old Maggie Seong is leaving home to join the inaugural freshman class at a small college.
Accompanying her is Edwin Hernandez, a friend of her brother John and her first unrequited crush since the
Flare cut off communication with her online boyfriend Devon. At college, Maggie discovers a devastating
truth her first day on campus when she meets her first love IRL: Devon didn't die in the Flare, and he lied
about who he really is and where he lived. Angry at Devon, yet attracted to the what-if of their shared
memories, Maggie is confused because her feelings for Edwin are growing stronger. When neo-Luddites
target the campus, Maggie will have to decide who her friends are, who really loves her, and who has been
sending mixed signals.
Verdict Maggie's simultaneous naivete and darkness mirror the civilization rebuilding throughout this series,
even as she struggles to balance the two. Gabriel and Arden (Signal Boost) and John and Mykhail (Radio
Silence) make guest appearances as Cole wraps up her trilogy, having provided three different books with
broad appeal for a wide range of readers; recommended for all public libraries.--Melanie C. Duncan,
Shurling Lib., Macon, GA
Duncan, Melanie C.
Source Citation (MLA 8th
Edition)
Duncan, Melanie C. "Cole, Alyssa. Mixed Signals." Xpress Reviews, 18 Sept. 2015. General OneFile,
http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A430495670/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=5ebce946.
Accessed 17 May 2018.
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Cole, Alyssa. Signal Boost
Melanie C. Duncan
Xpress Reviews.
(Apr. 24, 2015):
COPYRIGHT 2015 Library Journals, LLC
http://www.libraryjournal.com/lj/reviews/xpress/884170-289/xpress_reviews-first_look_at_new.html.csp
Full Text:
Cole, Alyssa. Signal Boost. Carina: Harlequin. (Off the Grid, Bk. 2). May 2015. 115p. ebk. ISBN
9781426899881. $3.99. POSTAPOCALYPTIC, NEW ADULT, MULTICULTURAL, LGBT ROMANCE
Jang-wan "John" Seong's family survived the first weeks after the blackout, but now he's going stir crazy
without his beloved technology and with his best friend Arden and John's brother, Gabriel, in love with each
other. Then Mykhail Shevchenko stumbles into their garden one night, planning to steal a few tomatoes,
only to be captured by John and Arden. Under questioning, Mykhail reveals he's no threat to their family,
and he knows the secret of the Flare, the event that caused the blackout. His plan is to journey to Burnell
University, a few days away on foot, to look for his professor, who may hold the solution to returning
civilization to normal. John joins Mykhail's quest, and the more the two are around each other, the more
their mutual attraction grows. Unfortunately, the solution to the Flare is in the hands of an egomaniac, and
any threat to his control will be neutralized.
Verdict Cole follows Radio Silence with a sexy and sweet romance offset against a darker plotline as John
and Mykhail discover the worst of humanity during their goal to restore civilization. This trilogy gets better
with each book; recommended for all public libraries.--Melanie C. Duncan, Shurling Lib., Macon, GA
Duncan, Melanie C.
Source Citation (MLA 8th
Edition)
Duncan, Melanie C. "Cole, Alyssa. Signal Boost." Xpress Reviews, 24 Apr. 2015. General OneFile,
http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A414006761/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=1199f005.
Accessed 17 May 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A414006761
5/17/2018 General OneFile - Saved Articles
http://go.galegroup.com/ps/marklist.do?actionCmd=GET_MARK_LIST&userGroupName=schlager&inPS=true&prodId=ITOF&ts=1526591975840 9/9
Cole, Alyssa. Radio Silence
Melanie C. Duncan
Xpress Reviews.
(Feb. 6, 2015):
COPYRIGHT 2015 Library Journals, LLC
http://www.libraryjournal.com/lj/reviews/xpress/884170-289/xpress_reviews-first_look_at_new.html.csp
Full Text:
Cole, Alyssa. Radio Silence. Carina: Harlequin. (Off the Grid, Bk. 1). Feb. 2015. 167p. ebk. ISBN
9781426899638. $3.99. POSTAPOCALYPTIC, NEW ADULT, MULTICULTURAL ROMANCE
When an unexplained, prolonged blackout leads to rapid societal collapse, roommates and best friends
Arden and John strike out across New York for John's family's cabin in the woods. John's older brother,
Gabriel Seong, rescues them from an assault not far from the cabin, but his domineering attitude rubs Arden
the wrong way, especially since he blames her for John's injuries. With the three of them trapped in the
cabin with younger sister Maggie, the additional problem of the Seongs' missing parents looms large, and
with no news from the outside world, they are on their own to find them. Complicating matters is the
growing attraction between Arden and Gabriel, both of whom aren't sure if the attraction is real or a matter
of circumstance.
Verdict Cole (Eagle's Heart) adds a strong contender to the postapocalyptic romance genre with a smart,
confident African American heroine and a smart, sexy Korean hero in this first book in a trilogy.
Recommended; public libraries should plan to buy the three titles to find out the answers to the source of
the blackout.--Melanie C. Duncan, Shurling Lib., Macon, GA
Duncan, Melanie C.
Source Citation (MLA 8th
Edition)
Duncan, Melanie C. "Cole, Alyssa. Radio Silence." Xpress Reviews, 6 Feb. 2015. General OneFile,
http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A401907444/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=0a124af5.
Accessed 17 May 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A401907444

"Cole, Alyssa: A PRINCESS IN THEORY." Kirkus Reviews, 1 Feb. 2018. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A525461549/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF. Accessed 17 May 2018. Giovanni, Kristina. "A Hope Divided." Booklist, 15 Oct. 2017, p. 30. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A512776123/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF. Accessed 17 May 2018. "Cole, Alyssa: A HOPE DIVIDED." Kirkus Reviews, 15 Oct. 2017. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A509244175/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF. Accessed 17 May 2018. Giovanni, Kristina. "An Extraordinary Union." Booklist, 15 Mar. 2017, p. 29. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A490998463/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF. Accessed 17 May 2018. "Cole, Alyssa: AN EXTRAORDINARY UNION." Kirkus Reviews, 1 Feb. 2017. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A479234768/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF. Accessed 17 May 2018. "Signal Boost." Publishers Weekly, 6 Apr. 2015, p. 46. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A409833272/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF. Accessed 17 May 2018. Duncan, Melanie C. "Cole, Alyssa. Mixed Signals." Xpress Reviews, 18 Sept. 2015. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A430495670/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF. Accessed 17 May 2018. Duncan, Melanie C. "Cole, Alyssa. Signal Boost." Xpress Reviews, 24 Apr. 2015. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A414006761/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF. Accessed 17 May 2018. Duncan, Melanie C. "Cole, Alyssa. Radio Silence." Xpress Reviews, 6 Feb. 2015. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A401907444/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF. Accessed 17 May 2018.

• Romantic Times
  https://www.rtbookreviews.com/book-review/princess-theory
  Word count: 260

  A PRINCESS IN THEORY
  Image of A Princess in Theory: Reluctant Royals
  Author(s): Alyssa Cole
  Attention-grabbing from page one, this first book in the Reluctant Royals series will absolutely warm your heart. A Princess in Theory is a delightful love story that introduces a princess — with attitude! — who readers will enjoy rooting for. Naledi is skeptical about modern royalty, but her ambition and tough demeanor shine. Cultural differences aside, this is a simple and heartfelt story to be savored.

  Ledi (Naledi) made her way through the foster care system after she was orphaned at the age of 4. But this is not a child without a backbone! Now she is a graduate student in epidemiology and she is no one’s fool. Ledi has a goal and there is no way she will fail. When she starts receiving emails from an African prince who wishes to discuss their marriage contract, Ledi finds it amusing — but she doesn’t have time for such nonsense. On top of that, a young man shows up to the restaurant where she works, and even though he is attractive, the poor guy also happens to be totally incompetent. (That can happen when you’re really a prince trying to get an introduction to your intended.) Prince Thabiso becomes more enamored with Ledi and, despite her skepticism, the feeling is mutual. But can this realist ever truly accept that this prince has come to America to marry his princess? (AVON, Feb., 384 pp., $7.99)

  Reviewed by:
  Jacqui McGugins

• Romantic Times
  https://www.rtbookreviews.com/book-review/hope-divided
  Word count: 232

  A HOPE DIVIDED
  Image of A Hope Divided (The Loyal League)
  Author(s): Alyssa Cole
  Brace yourself for another amazing installment in Cole's The Loyal League series! A Hope Divided features <>. The addition of Marlie’s mother's memoir is perfection, as it serves to both inform the reader of Marlie’s family history and to strengthen her bond with Ewan as he helps her to translate the text. In addition to the obstacles produced by the war raging around them, Marlie and Ewan must work together to assuage personal insecurities before claiming their HEA.

  In A Hope Divided we meet the youngest McCall brother, Ewan, and the masterful scientist and healer Marlie. Like Malcolm, Ewan is a Union soldier, but his vocation is a bit more violent than spying, and he's gained a formidable enemy among the Rebels. Marlie meets Ewan while donating her time and expertise to help heal prisoners of war. Whispered conversations and notes passed through library books help to forge a connection between the two, but it is only after Ewan escapes from prison and Marlie’s life is threatened that they come to realize what an incredible team they make. (KENSINGTON, Nov., 320 pp., $15.00)

  Reviewed by:
  Kristin Stec

• Romantic Times
  https://www.rtbookreviews.com/book-review/extraordinary-union
  Word count: 231

  AN EXTRAORDINARY UNION
  Image of An Extraordinary Union (The Loyal League)
  Author(s): Alyssa Cole
  2017 – Rt Book Of The Year winner
  2017 – Historical Romance winner
  Cole spins a tale that will pull you in from the very first page. Cole pens Elle and Malcolm's story in <>, and <> during the Civil War era. Elle is magnificent. She is a strong, self-sufficient, confident heroine who is certain to inspire readers. The hero, Malcolm, is the perfect complement to Elle. Watching the pair work together to undermine the Confederates is a true treat!

  Elle has a special gift — an eidetic memory. As a free woman living up north, she is quick to recognize that this unique skill will be invaluable to the Union cause. When one mission leads to a painful injury, a new opportunity arises: Elle must pose as a mute slave in the household of a prominent Confederate senator. The assignment leads to an unlikely alliance between Elle and a Pinkerton detective posing as a Confederate soldier. Though she's hesitant to place her trust in a man wearing the enemy's uniform, the two quickly come to realize that they will achieve more together than they ever could alone. (KENSINGTON, Mar., 320 pp., $15.00)

  Reviewed by:
  Kristin Stec

• Romantic Times
  https://www.rtbookreviews.com/book-review/mixed-signals-0
  Word count: 232

  MIXED SIGNALS
  Image of Mixed Signals (Off the Grid)
  Author(s): Alyssa Cole
  2015 – Futuristic Romance winner
  One of the best parts of Cole’s Off the Grid series is the way that she allows her post-apocalyptic world to evolve, adapt and change. Even better, she doesn’t skimp on the character development, giving readers a powerful story of new beginnings and old fears. Her characters’ physical and emotional journey together is exciting, moving and insightful, and the love triangle forces both protagonists to decide for who and what they are prepared to fight. Add to that a truly terrifying subplot and you have another winning installment in an addictive, intelligent and engrossing series.

  Four years after the Flare, civilization is slowly rebuilding, and Maggie Seong is leaving her family’s cabin to belatedly start her college career. At her side is Edwin Hernandez, the man who has promised to keep Maggie safe — and the same man who has turned down all of Maggie’s advances. Things look up when Maggie finds her pre-Flare internet boyfriend is alive and at college, ready to start where they left off. But when a group of neo-Luddite terrorists strike on campus, Maggie realizes just how dangerous the world can be — and just how much she has grown up. (CARINAPRESS.COM, dl $3.49)

  Reviewed by:
  Bridget Keown

• Romantic Times
  https://www.rtbookreviews.com/book-review/signal-boost
  Word count: 231

  SIGNAL BOOST
  Image of Signal Boost (Off the Grid)
  Author(s): Alyssa Cole
  Cole’s Off the Grid series succeeds because it captures the unsettling details of its dystopian setting beautifully, but also because its main characters are so very human and relatable. While both men in this second installment are exceptionally sympathetic characters whose bond offers hope in a treacherous and lonely world, Cole’s astrophysics student, with his awe of the cosmos and burgeoning self-acceptance, is particularly memorable. As there is a great deal of plot development in this book, new readers would do well to start this imaginative, funny and surprising series from the beginning.

  Though he is grateful to be surrounded by friends and family in the safety of their secluded cabin, tech guru John is painfully aware of his own personal uselessness in a world where technology has ceased to function. Until the night when a strikingly handsome prowler is caught outside their house, claiming to know the reason for the devastation and how to fix it. Astrophysics student Mykhail is determined to get back to his university and find the answers he needs, but letting John get too close could be deadly for them both, even if John is the first man to truly make Mykhail feel alive. (CARINAPRESS.COM, dl $3.99)

  Reviewed by:
  Bridget Keown

• Romantic Times
  https://www.rtbookreviews.com/book-review/radio-silence
  Word count: 232

  RADIO SILENCE
  Image of Radio Silence (Off the Grid Book 1)
  Author(s): Alyssa Cole
  Cole’s first Off the Grid novel offers a startling, believable post-apocalyptic world that is rich in atmospheric details and rife with unexpected dangers. Her refreshingly diverse cast of characters possess strong, sympathetic and magnetic personalities, ensuring that readers will be engaged with each step of their journey. The tension between her hero and heroine is palpable immediately, but Cole doesn’t make anything easy. As a result, their few stolen moments and whispered conversations are even more potent and memorable. Best of all, their vulnerability with each other makes their connection that much more powerful in a world that allows for no weakness.

  When the structures of modern society collapse, Arden and her best friend John set out for John’s family cabin near the Canadian border, desperate to find food and safety. When scavengers attack, it is John’s domineering brother, Gabriel, who comes to their rescue. Now, still searching for John and Gabriel’s missing parents and trying to fit into this new family, Arden is on edge, especially when it comes to her contentious, increasingly sensual relationship with Gabriel. In a world where nothing can be trusted, can Arden truly trust her own desires — or her heart? (CARINAPRESS.COM, dl $3.99)

  Reviewed by:
  Bridget Keown

• All About Romance
  https://allaboutromance.com/book-review/a-princess-in-theory-by-alyssa-cole/
  Word count: 1097

  Desert Isle Keeper
  A Princess in Theory
  Alyssa Cole

  Buy This Book
  Alyssa Cole is such a talented writer. I have liked everything I have read by her so far, and A Princess in Theory is no exception. This is a fanciful story, a modern fairytale, in which the prince of a make-believe African kingdom finds his long-lost betrothed and proceeds to beguile, lose and win her all over again. <>.

  Naledi Smith née Ajoua is an independent New Yorker through and through. She was orphaned at an early age, and was in and out of foster homes throughout her childhood. She has only a hazy memory of her parents, and her upbringing has left her wary and feeling unwanted, as though she has “defective Velcro” – no one sticks with her, no one can love her. Her adult relationships since she moved to college have reinforced this feeling, so she maintains an outwardly friendly demeanor while keeping people at arms’ length.

  Naledi, a brilliant PhD student, is currently studying epidemiology at The Institute. She works two jobs to pay for college and her living expenses, and she has no time and no money for leisure. One monetary mistake could have a domino effect on her life plans of becoming a notable scientist. The pressure of keeping up with the quotidian while safeguarding her future is intense.

  Recently, she’s been receiving spam email from one Likotsi Adelele from the Kingdom of Thesolo, reminding her that she is the betrothed of the most exalted Prince Thabiso and asking her to provide official pieces of documentation to verify her identity. Finally, driven beyond bearing by a terrible day, she tells Likotsi to take a hike in succinct Anglo-Saxon. And the emails stop.

  More than twenty years earlier, Goddess Ingoka had spoken through her priestesses and had chosen Naledi as the future queen and betrothed her to His Royal Highness Prince, Bringer of Light and Love, Thabiso Moshoeshoe of Thesolo. They were just toddlers, but ever since then, Thabiso has been conscious of a connection to Naledi even when her parents broke all promises and ran away with her to America. Those wounds of the past have festered in the minds of all Thesoloians, including Thabiso, and he is determined to find his betrothed and demand answers.

  Luckily, he’s on his way to America for a round of talks with various key people whose assistance would have a great impact on his kingdom and his people. Thabiso is the public face of Thesolo and he cares deeply and works hard to be a good caretaker while shepherding advancement of their national concerns. However, he is overworked to the point of being fed up and is seeking a respite from the constant pressure of being the sole heir.

  So when he meets Naledi for the first time in the kitchens of The Institute and she thrusts a plate of kale into his hands and calls him “Jamal,” he decides to roll with it. As it turns out, his princely training makes him terrible at being a subservient waiter. At first Naledi consoles him over that ineptitude, but even she’s infuriated when he sets the chocolate fondue on fire.

  Thabiso then decides to make another bid for her attention by moving in to the apartment opposite hers. He sends the occupant of that apartment off on an all-expenses-paid vacation and brushes off all of his personal assistant ‘s admonitions that he’s going full-on stalker mode.

  But egging him on is the thread of connection that had built up between him and Naledi in that godforsaken kitchen. He is fascinated by her beauty and her air of capability, and he is well aware that she is taken with his looks. And just perhaps, there’s Goddess Ingoka’s influence acting on both of them.

  The two of them really know how to talk to each other, to open up about themselves, to share ideas. Sexual chemistry is well and good, but conversation is sexier. Given the short timeline of the novel, the relationship development has to happen quickly, but it does not feel at all rushed. It feels like a gradually tightening connection that’s complex and tender. They’re both vulnerable to each other, while rejoicing that the other likes them for who they are. This is the first time each of them feels that. She, because of her foster care experience, and he, because of his royal experience – neither has been appreciated for their individuality.

  Thabiso is so enamored with being liked for himself that he is reluctant to divulge his the truth about his connection to Naledi. And of course, she finds out, publicly, at a party at which a number of important and influential people are present. How is she then going to forgive him for his betrayal? Is she going to fulfill her destiny to be princess of Thesolo?

  One thing I really enjoy about Cole’s books is the authenticity of her research. The biological details in this book are on point as are the world-building of cosmopolitan New York City and the Kingdom of Thesolo. I enjoy seeing characters who have interests and passions beyond their relationship with each other, so it’s wonderful to see how dedicated both Naledi and Thabiso are to their respective careers.

  I want to make a point about the sex scenes in this book. Like most romance readers, I have read scores of them over the years, yet there are some standouts. Those have unfailingly been so because the scenes are organic to the story and the characters – none of that action could’ve happened to two other people – and are imbued with deeply-felt emotions. The scenes between Naledi and Thabiso are just about perfect for where they are in their relationship, what has happened in the past between them, and a harbinger of things to come for their future together.

  If you’ve never read Cole, or never read a lighthearted story by her before, do pick up A Princess in Theory. I promise you won’t regret it.

  Book Details
  Reviewer: Keira Soleore
  Review Date: February 17, 2018
  Publication Date: 02/2018
  Grade: A
  Sensuality Warm
  Book Type: Contemporary Romance
  Review Tags: