Interview with Sheri Cobb South, Author of All’s Fayre in Love and War

What’s the story behind the story? What inspired you to write All’s Fayre in Love and War?

A few years ago, I read Peter Ackroyd’s excellent book London: The Biography. It’s an enormous tome, covering the history of the city from prehistoric times to the present, but it’s arranged thematically as well as chronologically—and the part that most captured my imagination was a section describing Bartholomew Fair, an event held in Smithfield (originally a “smooth field” just north of the City) every summer for more than 700 years.

I knew I wanted to write a series in which the fair would play a significant role, incorporating many of the real people and amusements, including a prototype of today’s Ferris wheel. I toyed with the idea of having different generations of the same family—surnamed Fayre, of course!—finding love at the fair in the Middle Ages, the Restoration, or perhaps the early Georgian period, and finally the Regency. In the end, I decided that researching three or four historical periods would mean the books would take much longer to write than I’d hoped, so instead I created the Fayre family: widowed single mother Caroline, her brother Oliver, and her younger sister Penelope, each of whom visits the fair with life-changing results.

I knew I wanted one book to feature a performer at the fair, so the first book in the series, Fairest of the Fayre, paired Penelope with a French émigré who makes a living as an itinerant swordsman. Book 2, All’s Fayre in Love and War, is Caroline’s story, and although its tone is very different from the swashbuckling first book, it still has touches of the humor that all my books contain. All’s Fayre is a classic “governess/employer” plot, and I’ll admit I didn’t realize what a challenge I’d set out for myself. After all, the best governess/employer plot has already been done: how is anyone supposed to compete with The Sound of Music?

If you had to pick theme songs for the main characters of All’s Fayre in Love and War, what would they be?

What an intriguing question! I hadn’t thought about it, but as a child of the ’70s, I have to say Barry Manilow’s “Ready to Take a Chance Again” would fit very well for both Caroline and the Earl of Westermain. They’ve both been married before, both have the scars to prove it (albeit in very different ways), and neither one is exactly eager to repeat the experience.

What’s your favorite genre to read? Is it the same as your favorite genre to write?

My heart will probably always belong to the Regency genre, but lately I’ve been dabbling in magical realism and even cozy fantasy.

What books are on your TBR pile right now?

I’m trying not to read the last of Sarah Addison Allen’s books, because then I know I’ll have to wait for her next release. I’ve just started Sarah Beth Durst’s The Enchanted Greenhouse, and it may be time for a re-read of Sarah Brooks’s (what is it with me and all these authors named Sarah?) The Cautious Traveller’s Guide to the Wastelands, just because I read it several months ago, and can’t stop thinking about it. I also grabbed The Mother Tongue: English and How It Got That Way out of a Little Free Library while I was on vacation.

What scene in your book was your favorite to write?

The scene that was the most fun to write was probably the one in which Caroline and her employer, Lord Westermain, go to the fair. I enjoy introducing readers to some of the real people who performed there, as well as the attractions available—some of which seem truly ahead of their time in a world without electricity. I also enjoy revealing facets of my characters’ personalities through their reactions to the amusements they see. (Why, for instance, does Lord Westermain have such a poor opinion of Romeo and Juliet?) And when my research turns up a dance troupe with a name like “The Merry Cuckolds of Hogsden,” well, I just have to include them! More to the point, though, this is the first “smoochin’ scene” in the book, and those are always fun to write!

Do you have any quirky writing habits? (lucky mugs, cats on laps, etc.)

I find it hard to write at home—there are too many other things to do there! So I take my laptop to a coffee shop and write my first draft there. Editing, though, is another story. I have to edit at home, scribbling notes into the margins of the manuscript and then typing them up. My eyes don’t seem to “see” typos, repeated words, etc., on a computer screen!

Do you have a motto, quote, or philosophy you live by?

Jeremiah 29:11 says, “‘For I know the plans I have for you,’ declares the Lord, ‘plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.’” The writing and publishing business can be crazy at times, and much of the result is out of my hands. Since the publication of my first book, the Bantam Sweet Dreams title Wrong-Way Romance, back in 1991, I’ve been “orphaned” twice by publishers who dropped the line I wrote for.

More recently, I had to break a contract when a series of family crises made it plain that I wouldn’t be able to uphold my end of the bargain. Even when a book is released without drama, there’s no guarantee that it will earn any money, be acclaimed by critics, or become a reader favorite. At such times, it’s nice to know that Someone is in charge, and that even disappointments may happen for a reason, may even lead to better opportunities in the future.

If you could choose one thing for readers to remember after reading your book, what would it be?

I doubt if this, or any of my books, will change anyone’s life; certainly, I don’t set out to teach any lessons with the stories I tell. Still, if I can give readers the sense of having spent an enjoyable hour or two at the fair, I’ll feel I’ve done my job.

Sheri Cobb South is the author of the new book All’s Fayre in Love and War

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