Rewriting the Romance

(2 of 2)

Quinn's latest book, The Further Observations of Lady Whistledown, is a set of four novellas by four authors, including Quinn; it's a kind of Julia Quinn production. The stories are all organized around a tart gossip columnist who appears in several of Quinn's novels. Quinn has a smart, funny touch with dialogue that's reminiscent of Bridget Jones author Helen Fielding's, and Quinn's characters have a roundness to them that's surprising and appealing. On the grand scale of emotional power, her work delivers about the same punch as a Friends episode--which is to say, it isn't Faulkner, but it's nothing one should be embarrassed to read in public.

In her next novel, Quinn plans to explore some darker themes--the hero is a widower whose late wife suffered from clinical depression. It's an interesting direction for a romance writer, one that might bring her perilously close to literary respectability. As she points out, "You always get more respect when you don't have a happy ending." So is she tempted to trade in her soft-focus covers for cultural credibility? To end, just once, with a funeral instead of a wedding? "Oh, no!" Quinn says quickly. "I have a mortgage." --With reporting by Andrea Sachs/Seattle