An Alternative Author Interview:

TCL’s Countdown Questions.

This week I’m featuring author
Kate Quinn.

Before I read “The Alice Network” and “The Huntress” I had heard of Kate Quinn, but never read any of her books. This is probably because her previous novels were set in ancient Rome, and although I enjoy that era for historical fiction, I think that Colleen McCullough’s Masters of Rome books mostly “Rome-d me out” (no, I never wrote reviews of those, sorry)! However, the WWII era historical fiction is something I haven’t gotten sick of yet, and with her last novel, Quinn gave me what became one of my favorite characters of all time – the Russian fighter pilot, Nina! With that in mind, I had to ask Kate to answer my questions, and here they are…

• If you could visit five (5) places you’ve never been, where would you go and why?

Lake Baikal (TCL: Oh! That’s in Siberia, where her character Nina comes from!), Sicily, Provence, Santorini, and Tierra del Fuego.

• Name four (4) foods or dishes that you enjoy so much that they’ve practically become part of your personality.

Simple cheese quesadillas (staple favorite of my childhood), the pizza that comes from the Italian restaurant down the street from where I grew up (Marri’s Pizza in Long Beach CA), my husband’s fettuccine with fresh basil and tomatoes, and ink-black espresso.

• There is the past, the present, and the future – if you could choose, which of these three (3) would you prefer to live in, and why?

As much as I love the past and wonder about the future, I think I’ll stick to the present!

• Best and worst – you choose which – name two (2) of either your best moments of your life, worst moments of your life, or one of each.

Hard to name THE best moment, but one of them has got to be the day I took note of a gangly college junior who managed, despite one arm in a cast and the other arm full of text books, to hold a door open for me. He later became my husband. Worst moment would be learning my father’s cancer was terminal.

• Name one (1) book you’ve read in the past year (or so) that you wish you had written, and why.

Book I wish I’d written…NO EXIT by Taylor Adams. A ferocious, marvelous heroine and a thriller plot so perfectly constructed and tensely paced it nearly killed me.

Thanks Kate! (And thank you again for Nina in “The Huntress”!)

Kate Quinn is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of historical fiction. A native of southern California, she attended Boston University where she earned a Bachelor’s and Master’s degree in Classical Voice. She has written four novels in the Empress of Rome Saga, and two books in the Italian Renaissance, before turning to the 20th century with “The Alice Network” and “The Huntress.” All have been translated into multiple languages. Kate and her husband now live in San Diego with two rescue dogs named Caesar and Calpurnia, and her interests include opera, action movies, cooking, and the Boston Red Sox. Kate is also one of the contributors to the upcoming collaborative novel about the women of the French Revolution, “Ribbons of Scarlet” (I already have my ARC), that will be released on October 1, 2019!