Welcome to the Interviews page, to read interviews that I have had recently or previous author interview that I did for the site, go to the bottom of the page and click on the link.

I will be interviewing an author or editor here every month. This month I interviewed author Julianne Lee.

Kyla: Welcome, Julianne. Thank you for agreeing to be interviewed by me. =) Can you tell us about your latest release?

Julianne: Gladly. My most recent publication is the second in a series, titled Knight's Blood. The first book is titled Knight Tenebrae, and is time travel to historical Scotland. It's about Alex MacNeil, a U.S. Navy fighter pilot, and Lindsay Pawlowski, his female passenger , a London newspaper reporter, who run afoul of an elfin spell and are transported to early fourteenth century Scotland. There they meet up with the Earl of Carrick on his way to coronation as King Robert I. Robert promptly knights Alex, Lindsay dons armour to pass as Alex's squire, and adventure ensues as they fall in love and find themselves caught up in the Wars of Independence. In the sequel, Knight's Blood, their baby son is taken by faeries and is quite a shock when he turns up again. The third in this series, Knight's Lady, is due for publication in January, and I hope there will be at least two more after that.

Kyla: Can you tell us what you are working on just now?

Julianne: The current project is a straight historical, no fantasy, about Mary Stuart. In it, Janet de Ros, a Scot living in London, is moved by the horror of Mary's botched execution to discover whether the Scottish queen was guilty of conspiring in the murder of her husband, Henry Stewart, Lord Darnley. I like the historical stories. History is fascinating, and I love the research.

Kyla: You also write under different names, can you tell us about your books and why you use other pen names?

Julianne: I've been published under several names. In Germany some of my books are under my maiden name, Julianne Bedford. That's to distinguish the romance stories published by Droemer from the historical fantasies published by Heyne. In the U.S., my first four books were published under a gender-neutral version of my name, J. Ardian Lee. At the time it was felt the fantasy audience would be less accepting of a female author. We've since rethought that idea, having more faith in the intelligent reader, and now my historical fantasies-and next year the straight historical-are published under Julianne Lee. All those are my own name, but one book was written under what they call a house pseudonym. Spanish Bride, A Story of Catherine of Aragon, was part of a series about the wives of Henry VIII. The pseudonym, Laurien Gardner, belongs to the publisher, and each book is written by a different author. So far there are two others in the series, about Anne Boleyn and Jane Seymour. My book about Mary Stuart will be similar in genre to these, but published under my own name.

Kyla: Your background is in Theatre. Would you like to tell us something about this?

Julianne: I've been acting since I was eight years old, and was a professional briefly during the early eighties. In my less than stellar career I worked with Christopher Walken, Sean Penn and Mackenzie Phillips, but when I was thirtyish I realized I was getting old faster than I was getting famous. My husband's career required we live in Nashville instead of Los Angeles, so I was forced to give up acting for writing fiction. Having no marketable skills, there was no other choice, except perhaps for pounding a cash register at a donut shop, which I've done. Fortunately, my degree from the American Academy of Dramatic Arts gave me the tools I needed as an entertainer and storyteller. I use that training every day of my life, and that's a happiness not everyone can claim. For the sake of keeping involved in the dramatic side of things, I work with an amateur theatre group called The Steeple Players. I've been on their board for twelve years, and they sometimes let me direct if I fuss at them enough.

Kyla: Tell us who your favourite authors are, do you have any recommendations about books we just have to read?

Julianne: Oh, dear. So many books, so little time! Contrary to the genres in which I write, I'm a huge Stephen King fan. More than just liking the spooky stories, King is a master storyteller in general. I believe in a hundred years students will be studying his work in school the way students of the twentieth century studied Dickens and Tolstoy. My favourite of King's is The Shining, but there are many gems. For time travel, The Anubis Gates by Tim Powers is my bible. I also love Oscar Wilde, and recommend A Picture of Dorian Gray. Plays are a big deal to me, too, so Wilde's plays are among my favourites as well. For more recent books, my guilty pleasure is the Janet Evanovich numbers books. I enjoy the humour, and that Joe Morelli is hot, hot, hot. And the one recent book that has truly impressed me, the most flaming must-read I can think of, is The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger. It's a tear-your-heart-out love story, and the only book I've read in years that made me wish I'd written it.

Kyla: It was wonderful meeting you at the Booklover Convention in Germany, Julianne, one final question. Please tell us where we can purchase your fabulous books and where we can find out all about your latest news.

Julianne: Thank you. It was lovely meeting you, too. I enjoyed that trip very much.

My books are readily available at nearly any online bookseller. A quick search on allbookstores.com turns up quite a few of them, and one can even find the out-of-print J. Ardian Lee books. Barnes & Noble is the best place to look in brick-and-mortar stores for the Tenebrae series. I'm also told my books show up at Murder One in London quite often. My website, where one can keep up with what's new in the Tenebrae series, is at www.julianneardianlee.com.

Thank you to Julianne for her interview answers. Look out for a great interview with German author Jeanine Krock next month.

Watch this space for further announcements of who will be interviewed next.

Kyla