S04.42: Brenda Jackson: Trailblazer

Fated Mates - A Romance Novel Podcast

Fated Mates

Society & Culture, Documentary, Books, Arts

4.9 • 889 Ratings

🗓️ 6 July 2022

⏱️ 102 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Our Trailblazer episodes continue this week with Brenda Jackson, contemporary romance juggernaut, the first African American romance novelist to hit the New York Times and USA Today bestseller lists, and the author of more than 140 romance novels. In this episode, we talk about her journey to romance writing — from writing in high school for her friends, while parenting, while thriving in a completely different career. We also discuss her career at multiple publishing houses including BET Arabesque, Silhouette Desire, Kimani, Mira, HQN, and now, with her own publishing company. We also talk about Brenda Jackson’s legendary families — the Westmorelands, the Steeles, the Madarises and the Grangers — about her relationship to readers, about her writing, about covers, about why 36 is a magic age in romance, and about keeping romance alive beyond the pages. We are thrilled to share this incredible conversation with all of you, and we are so grateful to Brenda Jackson for taking time to talk with us.

Transcript

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0:00.0	I did it in my spare time because I was taking insurance classes, getting designations behind my name.
0:08.0	That was my relaxed time after all my
0:15.0	boys, and my boys, literally games and all of that.
0:18.8	And my husband works shift works.
0:20.2	So there were days I went home and he was not there he was on the 3-11 shift and to fight the loneliness I would right until he came got off at 11 and putting boys in the bed and wait for him to come home.
0:33.8	That was my past time, so I could not envision writing for a living.
0:39.8	I'm like, no, my calling is to be Mistake Farm, Ms. Professional.
0:46.3	This is just something I'm doing to calm down after a day of work. That was the voice of Brenda Jackson.
0:57.0	Brenda Jackson who has written more than 140 books ranging from Arabesque to Harlequin silhouette desires to Kamani to H-QN to her own publishing house.
1:16.7	Welcome to Fated Mates everyone.
1:19.0	I am Jennifer Procop, a romance Reader and Critic.
1:23.0	And I'm Sarah McClain.
1:24.5	I read romance novels and I write them.
1:27.2	This is a real treat everyone.
1:28.8	We loved our conversation with Brenda Jackson.
1:30.9	It is fabulous.
1:32.4	She tells some great stories and we are really
1:36.2	excited for you to give it a listen. So without further ado here we are with
1:40.4	Brenda Jackson.
1:44.5	First of all, thank you so much for being on the podcast with us today.
1:48.2	We are, it's a real thrill.
1:50.6	So one of the questions we like to just really start with is ask people what made them a romance
	...

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