I recently had the pleasure of reviewing A Love by Any Measure by the lovely Killian McRae!
A Love by Any Measure (ALBAM) is a beautifully constructed love story about two childhood friends torn apart by class and wealth in the last 19th century Ireland. It was a fantastic love story and I am honored to be able to offer an E-copy for one lucky reader!
If you are interested in the giveaway it run from 2/3/12 to 2/10/12 and details can be found here.
Killian also agreed to do an interview with me as well, so without further ado please welcome Killian McRae to The Lit Bitch!
Interview
The Lit Bitch: Please tell us in one sentence, why we should read A Love by Any Measure (ALBAM)?
- Killian: Because love always requires a price to be paid, and it challenges the reader to decide at what cost it is just and worthy.
The Lit Bitch: What do you think makes ALBAM ‘special’ for readers? Is it the love between August and Maeve? Is it their individual journey or their journey as a couple? Is it the story line? The character growth?
- Killian: I think it’s the roller coaster ride. I wrote it in a way that, as soon as you decide you really like/dislike August or Maeve, the story is turned on its head and you have to re-evulate who these characters really are, and perhaps even why you excused or chastised their behavior or decisions.
The Lit Bitch: Can you see yourself in any of your characters? Who was your favorite character or the one you identify with most in ALBAM?
- Killian: Of all the characters, I’m most like Rory, I think. He keeps his piece, except when it needs to be played, and says little except what is important and needs saying. But in terms of favorites, I admit I had a soft spot for Owen.
The Lit Bitch: How did you come up with the idea for ALBAM? Was it a personal experience?
- Killian: Luckily, no, not due to personal experience, although we’ve all had relationships that made us question the worth of what had to be surrendered. However, this basis – the exchange of favors to a landlord or someone else who holds dominion over another – is an ancient concept, and is by no means a dead one. Relationships like this did and do exist in the world. What I wished, however, was to show a situation in which this relationship was given ground *because* there was this reality, not despite it. I feel it empowers Maeve in an era in which the Irish and women had not much opportunity to make choices otherwise.
The Lit Bitch: Who was the hardest character for you to identify with or hardest scene for you to write in ALBAM?
- Killian: Amelia is a woman whose willingness to conform, overlook and even accept is beyond my recognition. Yet again, however, there are examples of her type throughout history, women who, because a marriage brought them certain affluence or provided an easy out for their own misdeeds, accepted being a wife-figurehead. Mrs. William Randolph Hearst and Hilary Clinton come immediately to mind. The hardest scene, however, was the one between Maeve and Owen following the night at the pub. Dear me, that one actually had my chest tightening towards the end.
The Lit Bitch: What are your plans for your next project? What are you currently working on?
- Killian: I’m in the final stages of preparing my YA Fantasy Novella, Tallis, for release this spring. (Note: It will be released under the slightly modified penname, M.C. Rae.) Otherwise, I’m currently serializing my speculative fiction, 12.21.12, as a weekly podcast and am working feverishly on its sequel which I intend to release 12/22/12. (Assuming we’re still alive – wink wink.)
The Lit Bitch: Which literary character would you like to take out for tea or drinks?
- Killian: Jean Valjean, if he were real. (And tea for me, as I’m a Tea-Totaler). The magnanimity of such characters overwhelms me.
The Lit Bitch: Who is your literary inspiration?
- Killian: It depends on the style I’m writing. As alluded to in the previous question, I have an attraction to Les Miserables, and so Victor Hugo should come as no surprise. For building suspense, I look to Dan Brown’s structure. For fantasy, I take lessons from Frank Baum and Ursula K. LeGuin. In matters of spirit and poetry, Rumi is sage.
The Lit Bitch: You write a broad range of fiction styles (historic, speculative, romance to name a few) which genre is your favorite to write? Do you find it hard writing lots of genres especially when they are all so different from each other?
- Killian: By all measures, historical works or scenes are the most difficult. It’s easy to nail the big stuff, but it’s the small things that tend to slip past you. Whether or not you’re able to get away with it is, somewhat sadly, based on your reader’s knowledge of the era. For example, in ALBAM, probably most readers will think nothing of Maeve’s worry over not being able to make rent payments in the next month. Most readers won’t know that I fudged that bit of history, that, of course Irish tenants paid rent, but the rent was paid annually in a lump sum following harvest. (So far, no one has called me on this, but it’s just a matter of time, and the only defense I can offer is artistic license.) I do most enjoy writing fantasy however. I like being able to make my own universe and decide what its rules are.
The Lit Bitch: Who is your all time literary crush?
- Killian: Rhett. Freaking. Butler. I liked how coy he was, and how he finally got his head on straight enough to tell Scarlett to go to hell.
The Lit Bitch: And of course the quintessential question I ask all authors….what advise do you have for aspiring authors/writers? 🙂
- Killian: They’ll get tired of this, but it’s the truth. Write everyday. Even if it’s one sentence, don’t let the momentum slip. Remember, glaciers move slowly, but they leave the landscape transformed in the wake.
About Killian McRae
History is Killian’s primary love in life, outside her family and, yes, sadly her dog. Therefore, her works of fiction often are packaged inside historical wrappers, as she tugs and twists on the edges of reality to ask the ever-present “What if?” Born and raised in rural Michigan, Killian used the local library- a single room in her village’s firehouse- as an escape, before actually escaping to the relative jungle of Ann Arbor and the University of Michigan. There, after several minor attempts to establish a major, she finally completed a BA in Turkic History and nearly attempted a Bachelors of Music in Vocal Performance. (“Theys call it the opry ’round these parts,” she says in her heavy, Michiganian accent.)Though she had written three novels before graduating high school, she never thought of trying to publish for- oh, it must have been well into her 30’s. 12.21.12 was her first published work, released in late 2010. Killian is a member of Stanford University’s Writer’s Certificate program and a PRO member of the Romance Writers of America. Her other interests include musicology and did we mention history? She currently lives in the San Francisco Bay area, though she is quite often unhappy about this fact.
About A Love by Any Measure (summery from Goodreads)
An Irish lass. An English lord. A love that overcomes all boundaries, but at what cost? Lord August Grayson, English landlord, has secretly, and much to the dismay of his father, held in reverence the object of his first fancy: poor Irish tenant Maeve O’Connor.
Maeve,for her part, knows the danger falling for August holds, but finds her heart and her good senses becoming confused the longer she spends in his company.
Other Books by Killian McRae
A Love by Any Measure
I again want to thank Killiam McRae for stopping by and granting me an interview and giving away a copy of her book! Make sure to enter the giveaway and if you haven’t done so already, be sure and add A Love by Any Measure to your TBR list, you will not be disappointed! Cheers!
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