Karen Swan
© ALICIA CLARKE

Snowed in

Danger and romance mingle in Karen Swan’s latest Christmas saga

ELLEN SCHWARTZ

As snow falls, Libby and her new boyfriend travel to meet old friends at Archie Templeton’s grand family estate. Stranded by a snowstorm, the group is forced to spend the night. When the power goes out, secrets from the past begin to unravel, old antagonisms resurface and Libby is confronted with a truth she has long tried to deny.

That’s the psychological roller coaster that UK-based Karen Swan takes us on in her latest romance novel, Christmas by Candlelight. Swan writes two novels each year, one for the summer and one for the Christmas season.

Swan says that her success is surprising. “I’m something of an accidental author. I started out as a fashion journalist,” she says. “After I co-authored a self-help book, a literary agent urged me to try my hand at fiction. So, I wrote a scene and—eureka! It felt right, and I immediately knew that this was what I was meant to do.”

Swan has had more than 20 books published—both contemporary and historical fiction. “I love doing research, especially for the historical novels,” she says. “I dig into the culture, politics and lives of the era, and then create my own world within that sphere.”

Swan is more interested in the connections among her characters than just the “boy meets girl” part of the story. This was particularly true with Christmas by Candlelight. “Because there is a large cast of characters, and because the story unfolds in a claustrophobic setting, it was like writing a movie to be filmed entirely in close shots. I had to know all the characters very well, and it took several drafts to get there.”

Swan is strict about her daily writing regimen. “I can write anywhere because I learned to be flexible when my children were small. But when it comes to output, I aim to produce 15,000 words over five weekdays,” she laughs. “That might sound like torture, but knowing that I’m making steady progress actually calms me down as I work through the book.”

Swan is now finishing work on the third book in a historical series. Then it will be onto the next Christmas book for this productive “accidental” author.

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Ellen Schwartz is the author of 19 books. She lives in Burnaby, British Columbia.

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