Hello, how lovely can it be to be invited to a Q&A to launch The Prince of Pemberley?
I loved it!
There were questions from many interesting JAFF people, some authors of great novels such as Compromised, Love never fails, What would Lizzy Bennet do? and The Earl's conquest. Amazing, right?
Is Jane Austen popular in Brazil?
Yes, incredibly. We have Facebook groups
of 10k fans, our ‘Jane Austen Society of Brazil’ is pretty big too. I have to
say the 2005 movie has opened Austen’s domain to lots of people – and that’s
the beauty of adaptations, right?
How did you get introduced to this Jane Austen
world and how old where you?
Late 20s, I guess. I have a dear friend
who challenged me to read ‘the classics’ – her favorite classics – and gave me
Tolkien, Balzac, Austen. But it was S&S and the first pages killed me. I
wanted to jump in the book and punch John Dashwood in the face! Then shake
Elinor’s shoulders! As I complained, my friend grimaced and said: ‘Honey, you
need Elizabeth Bennet.’ Here I am, a P&P junkie!
Which is your favorite Jane Austen novel
and why?
P&P. Always.
But I have to say Lady Susan gnaws on my
heart, she’s my guilty pleasure. ;)
Who is your favorite Austen hero and
why?
Darcy! Always! *grin*
I like a bunch of other great Austen men
but Darcy for me is perfect because he is so flawed. He offends the woman he
adores when he’s trying to compliment her, his clumsy flirting is adorable, his
efforts to make things right are to swoon for… Darcy, definitely.
Who is your favorite Austen heroine and
why?
Elizabeth Bennet, without a question.
I find it very hard to digest women
being tramped upon. Of course, we’ve come a long and hard way from the social
situation in Austen novels, women whole in Regency England’s society was a lot
different, but still Elinor Dashwood’s or Anne Elliot’s reactions kill me.
Lizzy fights back, she refuses two very good matches, she doesn’t fall under
Lady Catherine’s diatribe, she’s great. I love her.
Who is your favorite Jane Austen villain
and why?
I should be loyal do Wickham but no one
pars Churchill to me. Wicky, as I see it, is a dimwit bad boy, what we call a
‘malandro-cocô’ in Rio. He scams and lies and deceives and end up tied to poor
and empty-headed Lydia. *shrug* But Emma’s Churchill… horrible, horrible man.
He flirts and lies and scams and humiliates the very woman he’ll marry. I was
so shocked when I first discovered his secret engagement to Jane Fairfax…
There’s also Isabella Thorpe, Fanny
Dashwood, Caroline Bingley but these sweet ladies can never have any spotlight
because Lady Susan is, wow, perfect.
Actually, I’d pick Susan over Churchill.
(I love Susan to the moon and back!)
How did you become interested in the
world of Jane Austen?
As I said, finding Lizzy after Elinor
opened the Austen wonderland to me. I searched for more, the BBC series
(Firth!... awww…), graphic novels and fanfics. When I discovered Mrs. Darcy
website I was in Heaven!
Do you write your stories in Portuguese
first and then translate?
No, I write in English and revise and
revise and revise…
I studied the language from 8 to 18
years-old, taught children and teenage courses for a while.
Do you find it hard to translate your
thoughts in English?
I don’t realize I do it, but I’ve been
told my syntax is ‘peculiar’, so I probably think in a neat jumble of
English+Portuguese. I write as I think about it, in English, as I’m doing now.
(I apologize for any syntax weirdness.)
What is the biggest challenge you face
writing in English?
The colloquialisms. I love them. Love
slangs and accents and how they color a character’s personality, make him/her
more believable. But, it’s tricky sometimes… every time I visit US (I have a
six-years-old who loves Orlando Parks) I spend my time trying to engage as many
people in conversation as I can.
Do you have a special time of day and
place to write?
I usually write after arriving from my
morning jog at the beach, but sometimes the plot is too juicy not to stop
everything and put it to paper.
My hubs gave me a ‘writer’s office’ as a
40th birthday gift. My design (I’m an architect), it’s really cute but
in reality he wanted me to dissolve the mess I created in our dining room
table. So, my smallish balcony is now a lovely office.
Where do you find your inspiration?
I dreamt the last story I wrote. It was
a long scene about a couple meeting again after a bad breakup and it’s clear
they still love each other but can’t find a way to be together. When I opened
my eyes I knew I had to write it. From that scene came the whole story and then
two more to form a cute project: Persian cats plot to unite three couples.
When your muse decides to be
uncooperative what do you do to get her cooperation again (walking, cleaning,
listen to music, etc)?
I give her time.
My muse is a whimsical indolent Lady,
she smokes smelly cinnamon cigarettes, those brown long ones with swirling
smoke and she smirks when whispering a good idea in my ear. When she’s taking a
break, I put the work aside and wait.
The Prince of Pemberley was left half
written, simmering untouched for several months, almost a year.
At first Darcy and Lizzy are friends, pals, ‘bros’
until the sexual tension wins them over. Conducting them was easy. Their lifetogether as a rightful couple once their divorces were done, that wasn’t
difficult because it’d be so nice – a life together after emerging from hell. But
the period in between when they cheat on their spouses repeatedly, are lovers
with so much baggage, so much love and contradicting emotions was very hard to
make it right (sorry for the pun, it’s wrong and they know and Lizzy freaks
out).
My muse took her time to help me write
exactly the way I wanted this story to be told.
When writing do you need quiet or do you
listen to music, and if so what kind?
I’d love to have peace and quiet!
Loooove it!
But I write in my free time, often
shared with my hubs and son. Especially when I’m in the middle of a hot scene,
whenever Darcy does this or that to Lizzy, I hear: ‘Mom!...’ *groan*
When I can’t absolutely concentrate, I work
on covers or playlists. Every story I write have a wicked playlist I like to enjoy
when working out.
Which of Jane Austen’s characters would
your mother say you are most like? How about your friends? Who would they say
you are most like?
My mom is into Brazilian historical
biographies. But, I’d say she would choose Catherine Morland for me because my
head has always been filled with fantastic stories, imaginary friends, alternative
views to everything.
My friends would dare to put me anywhere
far from Lizzy!
Who is your least favorite Jane Austen
character and why?
What a sad thing to think about… Elinor
Dashwood, I have to say. She’s lovely and sane and sensible and intelligent but
also so very compliant. I’d kick and complain, but she is so very classy…
coming to think of it, I dislike her reactions, not her.
If Darcy was on an Olympic football
(soccer) team, what position would he play? Who would be his biggest
competition? (Neymar Da Silva Santos, Lionel Messi, or Christiano Ronaldo)
I never see Darcy as spotlight guy, a
forward in soccer. I always see him as a backstage man, one that makes sure
everything goes smoothly, let someone else take the lights. So I’d say he’d be
midfielder, Zidane or Pirlo. (I may have been distracted by Mr. Pirlo’s looks.)
But I have to say that, after Germany
shamed us here in our own Maracanã stadium during World Cup, soccer is no longer
something we’re so fond of. We’re very hurt with our national team.
Actually, if Darcy and Lizzy each
competed in an Olympic event during the 2016 Olympic games in Brazil, which
sport would YOU want to watch them participate in?
I’m laughing here! What a great
scenario! Tall, dark and handsome Darcy in tight sportswear!
For Lizzy, a team… maybe handball. I see
her as a leader. Or tennis, she’d be great shooting cannonballs towards an
opponent, wouldn’t she?
For Darcy I’d say rowing. He does row in
my P&P inversion (he’s middle class and Lizzy is filthy rich).
Wouldn’t it be great to have a light and
funny fanfic about them meeting at the Olympic Village?
Which is your favorite Darcy and
Elizabeth to read – modern or Regency?
I like modern, love them. Because of
what I said, my difficulty to accept women’s whole in the past. But I’ve read
so many marvelous Regency pieces…
I’ve recently tried to write Regency and
while these short stories are good reads, I’d say they are modern stories in
Regency clothes.
Do your family and friends know you
write Jane Austen fan fiction?
Oh, yes! They’ve learned to love Darcy
because of me!
My hubs said he’s thinking about buying us
a cat to name it Darcy and be able to say: ‘Darcy, leave my bed now!’
So,
I’d like to know what inspired your covers? Do you also paint/design?It took us – my cover designer Cris Neiva and I - a
long time to choose an image that could translate the long and hurtful journey
these Darcy and Lizzy take – from friends to lovers to a married couple – and
we toyed with several sequences of pictures until we found this one. The kiss
seems ambiguous; it can be a stolen kiss, a reunion or a celebration of free
love.
I do paint and try craft arts but
writing takes most of my free time these days. My son is too curious, I cringe
thinking how much he’d mess with my painting gear…
What makes your variations different from
other writers of p&p variations?
My Darcys and Lizzys are half Brazilian.
In my first story ‘Friendship of aspecial kind’, they barely knew each other but he greeted her with a kiss on
her cheek; it’s a common thing to do here in Brazil, I didn’t think twice of it
but my Beta said ‘Whoa! What a forward guy! Why would he do that?’ *laugh*
Since then I’ve been taking care to ‘clean’ them of Brazilian zest, but there’s
the syntax…
Are your books set in the present day, or the Regency period? What
inspired you to write them?
Present day. The story starts in the
80’s when they meet as teenagers, than there’s a twenty years gap.
When I met my hubs, he was practically
engaged and I had an older boyfriend who was always threatening me with a
proposal. It was meant to be, we broke our commitments to be together but the
‘what if’ never left me. What if we had met a year later and we were both
married? What if we hadn’t managed to be together? What if… The prince of Pemberley
is about this doubt, a leap of faith, second chances.
Darcy and Lizzy meet as teenagers
through letters, England to Brazil by post, stamps, paper, envelopes – late
80s. They try to meet in person but fate intrudes. Then life gets between them,
they grow older and their friendship is put aside for twenty years. They both
marry and have children (in England, Darcy marries Anne; in Brazil; Lizzy
marries Wickham) until Lizzy finds him on Google almost twenty years after
their last letter. The friendship rekindles instantly and from that to love is
the journey told in three books.
Are all three books about Darcy? Or are we looking at future generations? Or are there men at
Pemberley the we know not of? Or are these sequels?
All Darcy and Lizzy. They both have
children, there is the next Bennett-Darcy generation, but it’s centered on
them. He is the King of Pemberley!
In my stories, Darcy and Lizzy are
together from the beginning and most of the time, I try not to fill it with subplots
that don’t add to their timeline.
The books are part of a single touchy story–
they are friends in book 1, cheaters in book 2, struggling to make it work in
book 3. Sequels, yes… but continuations, that’d be better said.
If you could spend two months at
Pemberley in the 1800’s, what three items would you have to pack in your
suitcase?
A toiletries bag, a phone (to record
conversations, take pics and notes), calming tablets – I’d freak out!
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Todos são muito queridos por mim até hoje, mas acho que nenhum causou o
mesmo impacto em minha vida que "
", produção do canal educativo
americano PBS. Quem foi criança nos anos 90 deve se lembrar dele.
Wishbone era um cachorrinho da raça Jack Russel Terrier que vivia com a
família Talbot. Leitor voraz, ele era praticamente uma versão live
action do Gato Pintado do "Castelo Rá-Tim-Bum", sempre traçando
paralelos entre as aventuras de seu dono Joe e as histórias clássicas da
literatura mundial para tirar pequenas lições de vida.
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, 
!). Mas
essa história possui um magnetismo impossível de descrever, que faz
dela a mais especial. Que sua obra levaria milhares de pessoas como eu a
formar longos de duradouros laços de amizade com outras Janeites tão
apaixonadas por seus personagens.
