strange and random happenstance: Stephanie Burgis

I started my blog in May of 2009. In the early days it was a haphazard affair. I didn't really have any theme other than, this is what's going on in my head at the moment; here's a TV show I'm watching, what about this book everyone loves that I hate, here's an actor whose awesome and would be perfect in an adaptation, you get the idea, in fact you can go back and read it if you wanted, I don't think I can cause of the cringe factor. I wasn't alone though, there seemed to be a lot of people doing book blogs that were a mishmash of ideas. The content creators of quite a few of them are still my friends but many blogs have gone by the wayside. Rest in peace book blogging craze of the late 2000s. There were quite a few authors who were debuting around that time and reaching out to the blogging community and they were getting a lot of buzz and Stephanie was one of them. Her debut, Kat, Incorrigible, was coming out in 2010 and it was all anyone was talking about. I really don't know if she knew this was going on, but those of us who are Regency mad couldn't wait to get our hands on it, I even found this really old blog post I did. Plus the US cover is so delightfully Disney with a dash of Coraline how could anyone resist? She also was one of the first authors I knew of who really used the web to engage with her fans. I remember I'd get up every day and get ready to blog but I'd stop by her website to see what was going on with her first. Over the years I've become more and more of a fan of her work and was beyond honored that she participated in my inaugural year of Regency Magic. I feel as if Stephanie and I have gone through this crazy book journey of the past fourteen years together, her writing books and me promoting them and adoring them in my little way. And I really mean little way, what I do is content, what she does is magic with pen and ink. And the magic she has been creating in recent years is once again set during the Regency, so how could I not ask her to participate again? So I'll be here gushing about her Harwood Spellbook series and her Regency Dragons series and probably her cat Pebbles, because she's just so adorable. I hope you'll join me and Stephanie!

Question: When did you first discover Jane Austen?

Answer: My dad read me Pride and Prejudice when I was eight years old, and I fell head-over-heels in love! I ended up devouring all of her novels, and I've re-read almost all of them many times since then.

Question: What do you think Jane Austen would think of her impact with so many literary offshoots, from parody to pastiche?

Answer: I'm sure she'd be pleased by her success, although she might wish she had gotten paid better for the books at the time she originally published them...

Question: Where do you get your inspiration from?

Answer: All of my books feature families, not just solitary characters, and that definitely comes from my own experience growing up in a big, noisy, loving family. As for the rest of it - the setting of my first Kat book, Kat, Incorrigible, was based on Bolton Abbey in Yorkshire, where my husband and I used to go almost every weekend to soak in the atmosphere and walk our dog. Walking around Georgian House museums all across the UK was really, really helpful. And the second Kat book, Renegade Magic was directly inspired by my many trips to the city of Bath, and particularly by the wonderful Museum of the Roman Baths, which is amazing. I highly recommend a visit to anyone who ever gets the chance!

Question: What makes the early 19th century mesh so well with magic?

Answer: It's recent enough - and popular enough - to feel accessible even for people who don't generally read historical fiction, but it's also distant enough from our own time period to feel exotic and a bit like a fantasy setting in itself! I think the fact that we accept so many different social rules and expectations when we're reading Regency-era novels sets us up as readers to accept different rules of magic/reality as well.

Question: The world building and system of magic varies greatly in the regency fantasy genre, how did you go about creating yours?

Answer: I've loved playing with lots of different kinds in my different series, from the secret-magic-rumbling-behind-the-real-historical-world setup of my Kat, Incorrigible series to the slightly-tweaked alt-history of my Regency Dragons trilogy (in which no one believes in magic but oops, dragons just got rediscovered!)...all the way to the flat-out, totally-different-history of my alt-19th-century Harwood Spellbook series (in which Boudicca kicked out the Romans centuries ago and 19th-century Angland is ruled by a Boudiccate of powerful, hard-headed women politicians who leave the more irrational, emotional magic to the gentlemen). There are so many different possibilities to explore!

Question: If you had to choose between writing only period literature or only fantasy literature, which would win?

Answer: Fantasy would have to win, for me. I've published lots of contemporary fantasy short stories in various magazines, and the MG novel I'm working on right now is set in a secondary world that's only loosely based on early nineteenth century Germany. But I would never want to give up writing historical fiction, either! I have a historical fantasy novel for adults coming out next year, Masks and Shadows, which is set in a real eighteenth-century palace in Hungary, full of intrigue, magic and romance. It was delicious to get to play with another rich historical setting as I wrote that book. I can't imagine giving up writing historical fiction!

Question: Be honest, have you ever dressed up in Regency clothes just to pretend for a moment you are in the past?

Answer: Ha! No - but only for lack of opportunity. I would loooove to dress up in a real Regency outfit just to feel it for myself instead of having to guess exactly how those gowns really feel on my characters.

Biography:
Stephanie Burgis grew up in East Lansing, Michigan, but now lives in Wales with her husband and two sons, surrounded by mountains, castles and coffee shops. She writes fun MG fantasy adventures and has had seven published so far, most recently The Raven Heir. She also writes wildly romantic adult historical fantasies, most recently Good Neighbors. She has had over forty short stories for adults and teens published in various magazines and anthologies.

Stephanie's Social Media:
Website
Instagram
Twitter
Goodreads