…I woke up, and I had to see if I was good enough.

Crescent Blues: Did your husband support your calling?

Linda Howard: Being a published writer is not a common thing. I was working full-time too. He didn't think it would really ever happen. But I wanted to do this. What was he going to do? Tell me "No?" Excuse me. We were two adults. I was not dependent on him.

Crescent Blues: That's one of the advantages of having your own job and paying your own way.

Linda Howard: Exactly. And I wasn't of that temperament anyway. You know, people say, "Oh, my husband will be so angry that I bought this." That thought has never crossed my mind.

But I bought a typewriter. I don't think he particularly liked it that I would go off in a room, instead of sitting in the living room with him watching television. But I explained to him that wanting me to do that was no different than me wanting him to stop watching television and come into the room with me and watch me work. And when I explained it to him that way, it was: "OK."

But when I sold the first book -- there's nothing like that first check for an attitude adjustment. Then it's no longer a hobby. It's: "My God, there's money."

Crescent Blues: It's real.

Linda Howard: It's real.

Crescent Blues: Not only among your family, but your friends change their attitudes too. She's not "the scribbler" anymore. We don't have to ask her when she's going to be published.

Linda Howard: I was always very private with my writing. The people at work didn't even know I wrote. Very few people did.

Crescent Blues: Was it hard "coming out of the closet," as it were?

Linda Howard: Yes.

Crescent Blues: Do you have a problem with marketing yourself?

Linda Howard: I have never done any self-promotion. At all. Not so much as a bookmark. That's not my temperament. In school, I was the extremely shy person. I've learned how to deal with it, and as I became more self-confident, the shyness receded.

I can speak in public now with no problem. So I am no longer a shy person. But when I sold the first book, I was terrified at the thought of losing my privacy. Now I know I have the privacy regardless, because the privacy's inside. You just learn.

Crescent Blues: Sounds like the learning was a good process.

Linda Howard: It was.

Crescent Blues: You mentioned that your husband is a "bassmaster?" What's that?

Linda Howard

Linda Howard: He fishes the Bassmaster Tournaments. He has been a professional bass tournament fisherman, full-time, since 1991. That's all he does.

Crescent Blues: I don't recall fishing playing a major part in any of your books.

Linda Howard: No, I'm not interested in fishing. That's his obsession, not mine.

Crescent Blues: How do you coordinate your schedules between his tournament circuit and your book signings?

Linda Howard: For the most part, it's two separate things, because the way the tournament schedule is set up, they take off during the summer. They don't fish during the summer months. That just happens to be when my books usually come out. So it doesn't correspond.

Crescent Blues: How do you find time to write if you're touring with him and touring for yourself?

Linda Howard: Laptops.

Crescent Blues: So you got into the computer age quickly.

Linda Howard: Certainly did. I currently have…how many computers do I have? One, two… But I can write in hotel rooms. I did some writing last night, but I did it by hand, because I didn't bring my laptop with me here.

We were just in Tennessee. [My husband] had a tournament in Tennessee, and I carried the laptop with me, and I worked during the day while he's gone. I just left the laptop with him and flew up here.

Crescent Blues: You don't have to answer this, but I've got to ask, because your drawl sounds so familiar. Are you from Alabama?

Linda Howard: Yes, I'm from Alabama. I've lived in the same county my entire life.

Crescent Blues: That obviously proved no problem, either in terms of dreaming or getting published.

Linda Howard: Actually, it's been a benefit, because I'm so far removed from the politics [of publishing]. It doesn't touch me, and it's so much more peaceful that way.

Crescent Blues: How did you get your start? Did you find an agent? Did you send to the slush pile?

Linda Howard: I sent to the slush pile. Once I decided that I was going to do it, I went to the library and I started researching -- Writers Market and all that. And I read heavily. I still read heavily. I've never lost the enjoyment of reading. I don't analyze it; I just enjoy it.

I looked to see who was publishing the books I liked, and I wrote it all down, and I made a decision and sent the manuscript to Silhouette, because this is where I am right now. And I was right. I'm very analytical in some ways. I'm instinctive in my writing, but I'm very analytical in everything else.

Crescent Blues: You may have sent to Silhouette, but you have a deep, dark secret. You read science fiction and fantasy.

Linda Howard: I read and write everything except horror.

Crescent Blues: Why haven't you felt like you weren't ready to publish a science fiction or fantasy novel?

Linda Howard: It's a growing process, and my natural strengths tend towards the romantic suspense. I haven't reached the point yet where I'm skillful enough, I think, to take it over completely and do a straight sci-fi or fantasy. I play with it for my own entertainment right now.

Crescent Blues: You mentioned in your speech to the Washington Romance Writers last night that you enjoy the dreams of others as well as your own. Specifically, Farscape and John Crichton. Do these characters ever find their way into your fiction?

Linda Howard: Their physical characteristics do but not their personalities or anything like that. In After the Night for example, Gray Ruillard was a physical combination of Adrian Paul and Antonio Banderas.

Crescent Blues: Oh man, I've gotta find that book!

Linda Howard: He was a physical combination of those two. I think Adrian Paul [the star of Highlander: the Series] is one of the most perfect looking men I've ever seen. I don't know anything about him, personality-wise, but physically…

Crescent Blues: I really enjoyed Highlander a lot.

Linda Howard: I went into mourning when that show went off the air. At the same time, I understand why [Adrian Paul] was ready to move on.

Crescent Blues: At least you've still got Farscape, even if they do keep doing terrible things to John Crichton.

Linda Howard: And they killed off Zhaan! And I'm pretty sure she's really gone, because she's not on the credits. And I don't like this screaming person. What's her name, Jool?

Crescent Blues: Maybe she'll tone down.

Linda Howard: Well, she's amusing.

Crescent Blues: So you do occasionally use the body types and physical characteristics of actors in your books --

Linda Howard: With Ben Browder [the actor who plays John Crichton], it's his blue eyes. He may have been the inspiration for Sam's blue eyes in Mr. Perfect.

Crescent Blues: And his cockiness. [Both women laugh again.]

Linda Howard: Oh yes, Sam was cocky in both the literal and figurative meaning of the word.

Linda Howard

Crescent Blues: Where do you see your writing going in the next few years?

Linda Howard: I'm totally open. It's whatever grabs me at the time.

Crescent Blues: Do you write one book at a time?

Linda Howard: I have several ideas that are not ready. I may never be good enough to write these ideas. I know they are beyond me right now. It's just whatever grabs me.

Crescent Blues: Why do you think romantic suspense has been such a fruitful area for you?

Linda Howard: It's a natural inclination of mine. My natural interests lie in jet fighters, weapons -- which is strange for a woman, but still, if you believe in past lives, God knows what's back there.

It could be that in times of danger is when human beings are at their best.

Crescent Blues: It goes back to the willingness to put yourself in danger for those you love.

Linda Howard: "Greater love hath no man…"

Crescent Blues: When you were growing up -- this is going to be a variation on last night's "orphan" question…

Linda Howard: I had a wonderful childhood. I grew up in the country. I'm the second oldest of six. I have two sisters and three brothers. It was a very traditional family. My mother stayed home and took care of us, and she was the goddess of the world. My mother never bluffed. She never threatened. When she told you that you'd better not do something, you could take it to the bank. She never backed down. What she said was written in stone, and that was the most secure feeling in the world.

Crescent Blues: Given the fact that you always knew you were a writer, were there any books or stories that particularly inspired you?

Linda Howard: No, for me, when I read, I just wallow in the enjoyment of it, and it's always been that way.

Crescent Blues: Any particular reason you don't read horror?

Linda Howard: I read Cujo, and it so terrified me that I read no more Stephen King. I don't want to be afraid of dogs, because I love them so. I read Silence of the Lambs and, literally, had nightmares every night for two weeks -- not about the book, just different nightmares. It triggered something. My imagination is vivid enough, thank you very much. So [horror is] off-limits for me. I prefer something more uplifting. I prefer happy endings.

Crescent Blues: Before we close, is there any question no one's ever asked you before that you'd like to speak to? Do you want to talk about your dogs?

Linda Howard: People ask me about my dogs all the time. I don't want to get started talking about my babies.

I'm a very instinctive writer. I don't trouble myself with "dos" and "don'ts," the market, the politics. That's the best part of living where I live, because I have this bubble of protection around me.

Crescent Blues: What advice would you give a new writer today?

Linda Howard: Don't pay attention to the rules, because there are no rules. Whatever rules that someone thinks there are, if you write a good enough book, it doesn't matter. So the best thing you can do is concentrate on the book.

Jean Marie Ward

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