We chat with author Jodi McAlister about A Study in Sparkling, which is a steamy romance about a single mum who’s absolutely not looking for another relationship . . . only to fall for the younger owner of her favourite wine bar.
Hi, Jodi! Welcome back! How have you been since we last spoke for the release of An Academic Affair?
I’ve been great! I’ve been very busy – An Academic Affair has done better than I ever could have dreamed! – but it’s been for all the right reason.
Your latest novel, A Study in Sparkling, is out now! If you could only describe it in five words, what would they be?
Woman gets love she deserves.
What can readers expect?
This is a romance between a single mum trying to get back on her feet after a brutal divorce and the sweetest younger man in the world, who offers to help her in a very, ahem, particular way.
It is, in many ways, a book about embarrassment: how do you put yourself back together you’ve been totally humiliated? how do you trust again, when the person who humiliated you was someone you thought loved you – and when getting humiliated again feels not just possible, but probable?
…and it’s also a book about wine. Seriously, if you like wine: read this book.
Where did the inspiration for A Study in Sparkling come from?
I’m fascinated by taking high-concept, soap operatic premises and making them feel emotionally grounded. That’s where Fiona’s backstory came from: being dumped by your husband for his secret second family is the stuff of melodrama, but I really wanted to dig into what that would actually feel like, and what you’d do next.
…and, honestly, I wanted to write about wine. It’s something I both know and care a lot about, and so delving into one of my hobbies (as opposed to my actual day job, as in An Academic Affair) and building up my knowledge in order to make Satoshi feel believable as a Master Sommelier candidate was a very fun challenge.
Were there any moments or characters you really enjoyed writing or exploring?
One character that I really gravitated to writing was Fiona’s oldest child Lex. They appear in the background of An Academic Affair as a quiet bookish tween, but digging further into who they are, how they tick, and how they’ve been affected by their father abandoning them proved to be a really interested mirror to how Fiona was affected by it. In particular, there’s a scene where Lex erupts that just sort of exploded onto the page – it made it from first draft to final copy with very few edits, and I’m very proud of how it turned out.
Did you face any challenges whilst writing? How did you overcome them?
Grumpy/sunshine is a tried and true romance dynamic for a reason: it comes with built-in conflict. This book, however, is sunshine/sunshine – Fiona and Satoshi are both intrinsically extremely lovely, sunny people. This is a big part of why they’re drawn to each other, but it also made their story difficult to write: how do you create drama and tension between two people who are so determined to be nice to each other?
Overcoming this involved digging into their flaws, especially Satoshi’s flaws. I had to make their respective niceness a bug as much as it was a feature – something that was standing in the way of them having the conversations they needed to have in order to really establish a solid romantic foundation as a couple.
What pulls you towards writing romance?
Romance is a genre that never gets old. Every couple (or throuple, or polycule-of-whatever-size-you-choose) is a universe unto itself, because to work, it can’t just be made up of anyone: it has to be made up of exactly the right combination of people. That means there are endless possibilities – an infinite number of potential happy endings you can find your way to. Romance is thus both enormous and extremely small and intimate, and I’m so compelled by that.
What are some of the key lessons you’ve learned when it comes to writing and publishing since your debut?
Probably the most important thing I’ve learned is that rest is a vital part of the writing process. Between my writing career and my day job as an academic, my schedule can be pretty brutal, and it often involves me trying to cram a lot of things – and write a lot of words – in very short amounts of time. However, you’re always more productive if you build in time to rest. You’re not a machine – treat yourself like a person.
What’s next for you?
I’m hard at work on the next book in this series! It’ll follow Chess (sister of Sadie from An Academic Affair), and, if you read A Study in Sparkling closely, you just might be able to spy who she’s paired with…
Lastly, what books are you looking forward to picking up? Any you’ve read so far this year that you’ve enjoyed?
I am so excited about Nina Kenwood’s new release People Skills. Nina’s one of my favourite authors and I just received the ARC in the mail – I can’t wait.
