This week, we’re welcoming author Anna Lee Huber whose debut title THE ANATOMIST’S WIFE has been hailed as “…a riveting debut…” and will be released by Berkley Publishing on November 6th, 2012. Anna Lee is here to talk about the novel and offer a copy to a lucky winner. Here's the blurb:
Scotland, 1830. Following the death of her husband, Lady Darby has taken refuge at her sister's estate, finding solace in her passion for painting. But when her hosts throw a house party for the cream of London society, Kiera is unable to hide from the ire of those who believe her to be as unnatural as her husband, an anatomist who used her artistic talents to suit his own macabre purposes.
Kiera wants to put her past aside, but when one of the house guests is murdered, her brother-in-law asks her to utilize her knowledge of human anatomy to aid the insufferable Sebastian Gage-a fellow guest with some experience as an inquiry agent. While Gage is clearly more competent than she first assumed, Kiera isn't about to let her guard down as accusations and rumors swirl.
When Kiera and Gage's search leads them to even more gruesome discoveries, a series of disturbing notes urges Lady Darby to give up the inquiry. But Kiera is determined to both protect her family and prove her innocence, even as she risks becoming the next victim...
My characters. I absolutely fell in love with Kiera and
Gage, and several of my secondary cast.
It’s been so much fun to watch them take on a life of their own. Nothing is more exciting than when one of
your character’s pipes up three-quarters of the way through the book and tells
you a secret you didn’t even consciously know they were keeping. But then you realize your subconscious must
have known, because you’ve been weaving in hints all along. That’s the magical part of writing.
**Q&A with Anna Lee Huber**
Thank
you so much for having me here at Unusual Historicals! This is truly a unique and wonderful place on
the web for authors who write atypical historical fiction.
Tell
us a little bit about yourself.
I
was born and raised in a small town in northwest Ohio, graduated from high
school in South Carolina, college in Nashville, TN, and currently live in
northern Indiana. So I know the Midwest
and Southeast fairly well. I wrote my
first book in the fourth grade. It was a
story titled Prom Duty that I somehow convinced my teacher to read to
the class, and subsequently I’ve always thought of it as my first success. I then wrote several more stories, including
a series featuring my own gang of mystery solving teens (à la Nancy Drew, Bess
& George) and a spin-off of Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego?. Life got busy in high school and college, and
somehow my writing fell to the wayside.
But I picked it up again about two years after graduating, rediscovered
my love for storytelling, and have been writing ever since.
What
type of books do you write?
My
novels are historical mysteries with romantic subplots. They also have a distinctly gothic feel to
them—dark and atmospheric.
Where
do you find your inspiration?
Many
places, but in the case of THE ANATOMIST’S WIFE, the story came from the
creation of the main character herself.
I had determined I wanted to try my hand at writing a historical mystery
with a female protagonist, and I wanted to make sure she had skills that would
make her useful during a murder investigation.
So I decided to make her a portrait artist with keen observation
skills. But I knew that wasn't enough. In that time period, ladies were
sheltered and cosseted from such grim realities as murder. There needed to be a stronger reason why
gentlemen would allow her to become involved with such a gruesome
undertaking. I realized that the one
proficiency that would make her absolutely invaluable to investigators,
particularly for that time period, was a detailed working knowledge of human
anatomy. So I set about finding a way to
give her that education.
The
only realistic way I could think of doing this was through the aid of a husband
or a father or a brother. But why would
one of these men elect to do this when such things simply were not done? Thus emerged the great anatomist, Sir Anthony
Darby, Kiera’s late husband, and his quest to write a definitive human anatomy
textbook. In his narcissism and greed, Sir
Anthony wished to keep the credit to himself, and so tricked Kiera into
marriage and then bullied and threatened her into crafting the illustrations
for his book, providing her with a large portion of the education an anatomist
of that time received. When knowledge of
her involvement with her husband’s dissections leaks out to the public
following his death, she is feared and vilified, and her removal from London
becomes necessary. She runs as far as
she can go, to her sister’s home in the remote Highlands of Scotland. But when murder follows her there, she
realizes there’s no place left to hide.
Is
The Anatomist’s Wife a stand alone novel or part of a series?
The
Anatomist’s Wife is the
first novel in the Lady Darby mystery series.
Book 2 is set two months after the events of Book 1, and will release in
September 2013. Book 3 is slated for
release in July 2014. All three take
place in different areas of Scotland.
What
kinds of research did you do for this book?
Lots
of reading—from encyclopedias, to journals and diaries, to detailed research
texts. Some were for cultural reference,
while others pertained to more specific areas of study, like nineteenth century
medicine, or the practice of grave robbing.
I also visited the UK—strolled through the Highlands, toured castles,
and tried to get a feel, a sense of my environs. My visit to the Surgeons’ Hall Museums at the
Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh was particularly insightful. There you’ll find the famed
would-be-body-snatcher-turned-murderer Burke‘s death mask, skeleton, and
several articles made from his tanned skin, including a book cover.
What
did you like best about writing The Anatomist’s Wife?
Anna Lee Huber was born and raised in a small town in Ohio. She is a graduate of Lipscomb University in Nashville, TN, where she majored in Music and minored in Psychology. THE ANATOMIST'S WIFE, the first book in the Lady Darby historical mystery series, has been hailed as “…a riveting debut…” and will be released by Berkley Publishing on November 6th, 2012. She currently lives in Indiana with her husband and trouble-making tabby cat. When not hard at work on her next novel, she enjoys reading, singing, travel, and spending time with her family. Visit her website at www.annaleehuber.com. Find Anna Lee on Facebook and Twitter.
