Please help me welcome today’s guest, Kay Jeffery…
Please tell us a little about yourself, where are you from? Where do you live now? Family? Pets?
Sometimes I look at my life and think I couldn’t have written a better story for myself. I grew up in the U.S. Deep South, a theater and arts kid who couldn’t get enough historical romance and stories about women with supernatural abilities. I spent an embarrassing amount of time trying to move objects with my mind before realizing that, while that was never going to happen in real life, with words I could do anything.
British history became my jam, and a study abroad program in Cambridge persuaded me to make it my career. Through schooling and the teaching positions I took, I gradually worked my way northward to Appalachian Ohio. In my third year of teaching History at a liberal arts college, convinced I would never find my true love in such a small town, by some miracle I met a handsome, super-smart, dry-witted geologist who makes my heart thump. We married, blended our pet families, had kids, bought a house and a minivan, the whole shebang. Now I’ve got my fella, three teenagers, and three adorable and demanding cats.
Why did you choose this genre?
Thankfully someone invented the category Historical Romantasy to capture my fascination with history, romance, and fantasy in one genre. The idea for my Nuns and Barbarians series just came to me one day: magical island ruled by a mythical deity, cloistered women who are refugees from the medieval patriarchy, hot pseudo-Vikings, and sexy times. What could be better?
As a historian, I found writing accurate historical fiction to be a bit of a minefield. I wanted more freedom to invent, to blend, to be wildly inaccurate if the story or characters called for it. Romantasy allows for creative world-building, yet the historical outposts give me inspiration and structure. I love playing around with myths and legends, old rituals and vocabulary, and making something new from them. My stories are anchored in the past but have a modern sensibility. The more novels I write in this world I’ve constructed, the more depth it has, which has been incredibly rewarding. Sometimes the awful truth of contemporary reality is too much to bear, and then I tell my friends I’m headed off to my island where the women are in charge, their men support them unconditionally, and I control the weather.
Where did you get the idea for The Little Nun’s Silver Fox?
Confession: My favorite romance trope is shy librarian meets dangerous, compelling stranger. I knew the women of Adytum Abbey would have a library—it’s a convent! Old books contain so much magic in themselves, and this was a fantastic chance to delve more deeply into the island’s origin story deep in mythology.
The library setting provides access to all kinds of mysteries about the convent. Words have power, but the library assistant Grace doesn’t at first realize she can access that reservoir of strength for herself. A dreamer, she gets lost in stories and thinks of herself as small and insignificant. Her dangerous stranger, Ivar, though he’s a barbarian, had to have an interest in books himself to facilitate their meeting, and so I made him an older, wiser, cynical treasure-hunter. He knows the value of stories for showing him where to find glittery things, but the tale he and Grace uncover—and tell each other over the course of the novel—helps him see where the real treasure lies. This age-gap story is deliciously angsty with a high spice level.
What’s been unexpectedly fun about the Nuns and Barbarians series is the way the stories interconnect with each other. The Little Nun’s Silver Fox is the third in the series, though the books can be read in any order, and you can definitely start with this one if (like me) libraries are your thing. I created a real pickle for myself as an author by having all the events of the barbarian invasion occur within a three-day window. As a result, each novel is happening at the same time as the others, at least in the first five books. (The next two are in the pipeline, so stay tuned.) Readers should be able to pick up any of the first five books and start there. As they read the others, they’ll see crossover characters, different parts of the island backstory, and clues of a hidden conflict emerging. I hope readers find each book—no matter where they start—adds layers to their experience of this magical world.
What do you want readers to come away with after they read The Little Nun’s Silver Fox?
Ultimately, all my books are about the power of romantic love. When women and men come together as equals, that’s when the magic happens. The women of Adytum Abbey have ended up on the island because of oppressive circumstances. In the convent they’ve found how self-sufficient they can be—as independent, unique individuals with their own talents and desires.
When the barbarians arrive, these men realize that on this island they aren’t the ones in control. Violence gets them nowhere. Both men and women will have to respect each other and give a little in order to find how powerful they can be when they join forces. Mostly, I want readers to have a satisfying emotional experience that helps them believe that true love exists and that it can move mountains—both of which I believe with my whole heart.
Are there any tricks, habits or superstitions you have when creating a story?
My main trick for writing is making my body open up the laptop and click on the file without consulting whether my spirit is “feeling it” today. First body, then spirit—that has been the key to keeping writing progress going for me.
Life can be so distracting that I’ve discovered the value in retreating to what I call my “sensory deprivation chamber”: a library study room. I walk to the library with my writing materials, tea bags, and lunch; I take myself to a study room, make the tea, and open the laptop. I start with a goal of 1000 words per day. As the story takes off, my word-count goal expands. Sometimes it’s hard to get those words, and sometimes they flow. Either way, I show up and get to work. As my husband reminds me when I’ve had a slow day, it’s all progress.
A third strategy is walking a lot. Walking is conducive to thinking and daydreaming—especially if you leave the earbuds at home. If I’m stumped, I take a turn around the block or walk through the library stacks. I’m always telling stories in my head, and if I’ve got a novel underway, my brain will work on it while my feet are moving so I’m ready to write as soon as that laptop opens up. First body, then spirit.
What’s your favorite book of all time and why?
“Reader, I married him.” It’s Jane Eyre. Of course, it’s Jane Eyre. The bookish governess and the dangerous anti-hero! The angst! The redemption! Did I mention the books? Though Jane seems meek, she is the driver of her story. Her fierce, independent spirit is never cowed, even as she chafes against social restrictions and the moral compromises her lover asks of her. She never forgets who she is—even when she forgets who she is!
When I was a teenager with a taste for bad boys, I loved Mr. Rochester. As a college student growing in feminist sensibility, I hated him. As a seasoned adult, I adore how Jane navigated her tortured romance with strength, passion, and a fundamental integrity. In the end, Rochester didn’t marry Jane, she married him. Ah. That’s the good stuff.
What book have you read that you wish you had written?
Any novel by Jennifer Crusie. She’s the first author I remember reading and thinking: I wish I had written this. Her stories have real emotional tension, along with relatable interpersonal conflicts. But the characters are vibrant, memorable, and so, so funny, just being themselves. The characters’ foibles drive the plot, which clips along at a brisk pace. Crusie’s sense of humor also comes through in her narrative voice, word choice, sentence structure—I’m not sure exactly how she does it, but it’s delightful. The humor accentuates the human drama. She teamed up with Bob Mayer on several books, and those two authors are a stellar combination, providing both male and female perspectives. Plus, there’s always a happily-ever-after, which is a must for me.
What is your favorite movie?
I have two favorites: The Princess Bride and Roxanne (the Steve Martin/Daryl Hannah version of Cyrano de Bergerac). I’ve always been drawn to fairytales, and these two fit the bill. Both of them are romances, in which the hero and heroine have to recognize each other through disguises necessitated by social pressures. The hero’s love in both is steadfast, as he falls for a woman who is strong, kind, and intelligent.
Both of them are comedic, not only in the sense of having a happy ending. They are genuinely funny. The humor comes from the characters’ distinct natures shining through as well as the unique storytelling tone—not to mention a good measure of slapstick. Yet these characters face real and terrible obstacles on the way to their fairytale conclusions. To me, they illustrate what J. R. R. Tolkien said about fairy stories: that they feel like tragedies until, in the end, eucatastrophe breaks through. True love never dies. Miracles can happen. Life and love can turn out …as you wish. (Couldn’t help myself.)
What do you love that most people don’t like and wouldn’t understand why you do?
My love for both History and Romance often seems incongruous to people. As a romance novelist, my appreciation for the gritty realities of history— not only its triumphs but its tragedies and disappointments—can seem contrary to my penchant for a happy ending. I’m not into whitewashed histories that make everyone feel good. It’s important that we tell the truth about the past. If I tell someone I’ve just met that I’m a historian, I often get a grimace while they confess how much they hated History classes in school.
As a professional historian, I hid my love of bodice-ripper romances for a long time. When people find out I’m an avid romance reader, too, they often scratch their heads at the supposed unseriousness of my choice of reading material. Here’s the truth: I’m a historian because I gorged myself on historical romances from the time I was old enough to steal them from my mother’s bookshelf.
What History and Romance have in common is centering human relationships. I find people fascinating. We’re wonderful, frustrating, malicious, virtuous, selfish, generous, and absurd. We understand ourselves through the stories we tell, not only about what really happened in the past, but also what we wish could be true, for us and our society.
At a personal level, I’ll also say this: I dislike not knowing. Life is too full of uncertainty. I need to know the ending of the story before I begin. History and romance novels give me that.
What is your favorite quote?
My favorite quote is about history, books, and magic. In Cosmos, Carl Sagan said, “What an astonishing thing a book is. It’s a flat object made from a tree with flexible parts on which are imprinted lots of funny dark squiggles. But one glance at it and you’re inside the mind of another person, maybe somebody dead for thousands of years. Across the millennia, an author is speaking clearly and silently inside your head, directly to you. Writing is perhaps the greatest of human inventions, binding together people who never knew each other, citizens of distant epochs. Books break the shackles of time. A book is proof that humans are capable of working magic.”
Beautiful, poetic, and true. I think the library is calling me.
He’s hunting for treasure; she sparkles like sapphires.
Blurb:
Come away to an enchanted island where the nuns of Adytum Abbey have made their idyllic home . . . until a band of barbarians invades in search of forbidden treasure.
The promise of one last treasure hunt lures experienced raider Ivar to Adytum Abbey, whose library holds clues to undiscovered riches as well as deeply buried mysteries about the island itself. Can shy librarian Sister Grace persuade Ivar that love is the greatest treasure of all—before it’s too late?
Excerpt:
Grace froze in her hiding spot, one delicate page of the book held between two fingers.
The pirates were here!
Somehow they had gained entry to the library, despite Alice locking it with the heavy key she kept tucked into her habit’s long pocket.
Over the thundering of her heart, Grace heard the two men having some kind of conversation with each other. One’s voice was quite low and rumbly; the other one was in the middle range and smooth as that second man exchanged words with the first. Hmm, nice.
His mellow voice sent a little shiver down her spine—and not from fear.
She heard the armoire door open and close with its distinctive creak, confirming that she’d been wise not to hide there. She couldn’t help but wonder with trepidation where they would search next. Her heart fluttered in her chest.
Grace knew it would be foolish to peek from her hiding spot in the low bookshelf. So foolish!
But the temptation was too much and, really, if she just pulled up this one little part of the sheet at the side and scrunched down so her head was resting on the bottom of the shelf, she’d be able to see them. If only for an instant.
Slowly, slowly, she closed the book and, holding it in her right hand, she extended the pointer finger of her left hand to raise the sheet …just …the tiniest …bit.
There! One of the men came into her view.
It had been so long since she’d seen a man that she’d practically forgotten what they were like. This one was enormous—were men always so large?—and dark haired. He had dressed entirely in black. He said more to the other man in his very deep voice, and Grace realized the smooth, shivery voice belonged to the other one, the one she couldn’t see. As Deep Voice moved farther into the room, the second man came into view, and Grace’s breath caught in her throat.
Though he was equally large, his hair was a striking silver, pulled back in a long braid woven through with a strand of leather. He spoke again in that really quite nice voice, turning his head just a bit, and a beam of sunlight lit up a crescent-shaped blue jewel embedded in his earlobe.
Grace’s eyes trailed over his body, the broad shoulders and barrel chest covered in the cream-colored linen of his shirt, open at the throat. As her gaze slipped down to his thick waist, she saw that his shirt was tucked into tight leather trousers. So very tight they are. Her eyes followed the length of strong thighs and calves that led down to booted feet. She noticed the weapon hanging from his belt, some kind of hatchet, and her blood chilled.
The weapon was a reminder that, despite his beauty, he was dangerous.
Buy links:
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-little-nuns-silver-fox-kay-jeffery/1149947784?ean=9781509266029
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/251387510-the-little-nun-s-silver-fox
https://www.booksamillion.com/p/Little-Nuns-Silver-Fox/Kay-Jeffery/9781509266029
https://wildrosepress.com/product/the-little-nuns-silver-fox
About the Author:
Award-winning author Kay Jeffery is a professional historian who loves stories. One day during her midlife crisis, Kay remembered that she’d always wanted to write romance novels. Her husband said, “I think you should do it.” Her kids were glad to have her (more or less) out of their business. Thrilled to have a stable lap for long periods of time, the cats discovered quickly that typing does not preclude scritches. And so Kay carved out pockets of time in between family life and her job to research such arcana as medieval love songs, Nordic swearwords, ancient Celtic rituals, obscure mythological divinities—and to weave them all together. The debut book in her Nuns and Barbarians series, Love Song for the Barbarian, won first place in the 2026 National Excellence in Story Telling (NEST) contest, in the category of erotic fiction. Her writing builds a fantasy world where strong, intelligent, loyal, and courageous heroines and heroes find their way to each other, where dreams are realized, and where love always, always wins.
Website: https://kayjeffery.com
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Author Alicia Dean 