Hello Austen Connection friends,Here in the Austen world I’ve noticed that many of you consider December and the holidays the time of romance: We see you with your lights, your lattes, your Hallmark binges - and more power to you. Today’s missive fits right into your romance dreams, and features our conversation with long-time romance and historical fiction author Vanessa Riley. And it’s a podcast episode! So you can simply click Play above to stream this conversation, or you can listen on Apple or Spotify. It also has suddenly struck me that I should tell you that you can, any time, simply go to the Austen Connection site and see many conversations like this one, plus podcast episodes, chats, and general #JaneAusten breakdowns, all free and waiting for you to curl up on the sofa with (don’t forget your cuppa tea). Enjoy!And now, for our main feature of the week: Author Vanessa Riley.Dr. Riley - who has a PhD. from Stanford in mechanical engineering - has always found romance to be, as she says, a “happy place.” She tells us she began burning through Signet romances while an undergrad - as a break from “differential equations”!And she was first inspired to discover the hidden histories of Black and biracial women of the Regency and colonial-era Caribbean when she came across that Jane Austen novel fragment we know as Sanditon. Austen’s biracial heiress of the West Indies - Miss Georgiana Lambe - started Vanessa Riley on this journey. Dr. Riley’s latest novel Island Queen is all about the real life of Dorothy Kirwan Thomas. Dorothy, or “Doll,” Thomas was a Regency-era entrepreneur who became a dynamic figure in the early 1800s Caribbean. She was born into slavery on the island of Montserrat, and worked to buy her freedom and go on to become a wealthy landowner, leaving a legacy of children, and grandchildren, some of whom were educated in England. And she also had some interesting lovers along the way. After being introduced to Austen’s Miss Lambe, Dr. Riley began digging for evidence of Regency-era and colonial women of color, and her research led her to the life of Dorothy Thomas, and eventually led to the novel Island Queen. The book has been optioned for the screen by two of the creatives behind the Netflix series “Bridgerton” - director Julie Anne Robinson and actor Adjoa Andoh, who plays Lady Danbury in the series, have teamed up with producer Victoria Fea. The life of Dorothy Thomas is fascinating, and telling her story involves using a lot of words we might not associate with women surviving under colonial oppression - words like entrepreneurship, agency, manumission, wealth, power, romance. And perhaps the most important three words of all: Happily Ever After. In this conversation for the Austen Connection podcast, Vanessa Riley talks about how she went from being a Math major, and then an engineer - to being a writer. She says if you love writing, that doesn’t leave you - no matter how many degrees you have. Enjoy the conversation!Plain Jane What attracts you to the romance genre? Vanessa RileyThe promise of the Happy Ever After. And you need that after you take a test for differential equations. Plain JaneYes! Is this what got you through grad school? Vanessa RileyYes. And undergrad is actually when I really started reading every Signet romance known to mankind, because they were nice and quick. And bananas - the plots were all over the place. And it was just something different to do. You know, engineering programs can be very intense … and sometimes you just want something [where] you know the ending. That you don't have to integrate under a curve. You just want to be assured of a happy place. And romance has always been that happy place. Plain JaneYeah, so you like the structure. But a lot … can happen within that courtship plot. Do you find that you find intellectual challenges within that, that might be surprising to people who don't know the romance genre? Vanessa RileyFor those who don't know the romance genre