Good Afternoon! Thank you so much for taking the time to answer a few questions.


I would like to start by asking you a little about yourself. What would you like your fans to know about you?

Many times I’ve been asked whether I am a witch, since I write about them, and the answer is “no, I am not.” I am, however, a lawyer and have been called something that rhymes with witch. :) I’ll take the Fifth on whether or not that term applies. I will say in my defense that the people who called me that word were on the opposite side of the case, and I was doing a good job for my client. Of course, those days are behind me. Now, I write paranormal romantic suspense and medical-legal thrillers in the time I take away from my day job as an arbitrator.

Abode-wise, I have homes in both Carmel, Indiana and Austin, Texas. Why two homes? My husband of thirty-three years is an avid golfer, so we had to find a place that he could play golf in the winter. Austin was where we landed, but only after I’d rejected Florida (too many bugs and too humid) and Las Vegas (too much temptation in the form of gambling). Personally, I would’ve liked a vacation/retirement home on a nice, cool lake in Upper Peninsula Michigan, on the Cape or in Nova Scotia – but you can’t play golf in those places in the winter. I am so not a hot weather person.

My hubby and I have one son who is nineteen and will be a sophomore at University of Oregon next Fall (like me, my son likes cooler climes, but he told me categorically that I could not move into the dorm even though I was voted a pretty cool mom, for a mom.)

I think many people are classified by the types of pets they own, so I will tell you that we are cat people. The two cats that own us are Oliver, a 15-year-old tabby/Maine Coon mix and Pidge, a black-and-white stray who we think is about one-year old.

My hobbies are reading, reading, and more reading - - when I am not writing. Oh, and I am a Pisces, with Taurus rising.

How do your experiences as a lawyer influence your writing?

In my Monette Michaels’ thrillers (Death Benefits, Vested Interests and Blind-Sided), I use my background quite a bit since all of those books involve something to do with law. My Gooden & Knight paranormal mystery series (written as Monette Michaels) features a witch-lawyer by the name of Abigail Merriweather Gooden. I like to think of it as Perry Mason meets woo-woo. Although the clients are preternatural creatures, they have human legal problems. Abbie will act and talk like a real lawyer – in fact, her voice is mine. :) However, I will reiterate, I am not a witch. As for my Rae Morgan paranormal books, one or two may have a lawyer or someone in the law enforcement world in them. I use what I know – and I know a lot of really trivial things about a lot of different things, especially law.

Why do you write under Rae Morgan vs. Monette Michaels?

The use of two names was really a fluke. I’d been writing romantic suspense, some of it with paranormal influences, as Monette Michaels for five years when my publisher of Vested Interests, Linda Eberharter, asked me to write a lead off novel for her new more sensual line of books, Liquid Silver Books. Since I wasn’t sure I could write a sexier book (my Michaels’ books have sex, are sometimes rather dark, and were already considered sexy by my Canadian publisher), I decided I needed to use another name. I also thought the sexier book would be a one time thing – let me repeat that – a one time thing. LOL LOL So, I wasn’t concerned about using two names in the long term.

Destiny’s Magick came out January 15, 2003. Sales just zoomed! I was floored. Here, I was making money right and left from this one book – more money in the first quarter of 2003 than I had made in three years on my Monette Michaels books (and those had been doing just fine). So, I had to take a step back and re-examine my career. And my decision was to write at least one book each year for each pen name. And that is what I have done with some short stories and novellas peppered in there to alleviate boredom. :)

How do you choose which name to use?

The Coven of the Wolf series is a Rae series. I tend to write stand-alone books under Monette’s name, but now I have the Gooden & Knight series. Really, what it all boils down to is that Rae’s books just have more sex scenes in them than Monette’s. :) The voice is the same in both.

How do you write? Computer or pen and paper?

Computer!!! I love the delete key.

Do you use music to help you write?

Yes! I love my iPod. I write to Metallica (they rule!!), U2, Danzig, Led Zeppelin, Aerosmith, Guns and Roses, Evanescence, Three Doors Down, Crossfade, Breaking Benjamin, Papa Roach, Santana, and Josh Groban. Okay, so Josh does not fit into the mix, but his voice and soaring tones just give me goosebumps, and on the albums I own he sings mostly in Italian, so I don’t care what the songs are about – they just evoke a mood. :)

Is there any kind of ritual you go through before writing? Like candles or meditation?

Oooh boy. Um, not really, unless you count walking around the house and telling son and husband that I will be writing and that I DO NOT want to be disturbed unless the house is falling around our ears.

Of course, that ritual doesn’t ever work; they always have to bother me.

For example:

I’m well into a chase scene fraught with tension and danger. Shuffle, shuffle comes the sound of size-fifteen-feet. Son stands just outside my office. Says nothing.

I turn and say in a mixture of anger and frustration, “What?!”

Son: “Nothing, just wondering what we’re going to have for supper?”

Please note: It is one o’clock in the afternoon and he just had lunch.

Moi: “I’m writing, and you’re bothering me about supper which is over four hours away?”

Son looks at me like I’m stupid and says: “Uh, well, yeah.”

Moi: “Ask me that question in four hours and I might have an answer. Now scram.”

Son leaves, but not before shooting me the “you are so mean” look. Two minutes later my husband comes to the door. Says nothing.

I turn and say, “What?!” See above for tone of voice.

Hubby: “Whatcha doin’?”

Moi: “I’m writing, I told you that. I have a deadline.”

Whipped puppy look passes over hubby’s face: “Oh, sorry. I’ll go.”

Moi, sighing: “Wait, what’s wrong?”

Hubby stops, still with whipped puppy look: “I’m so lonely.”

At that point, I turn off the computer and go humor my man – and plan supper.

So, yes, I have a routine, but not one of my choosing. I tell them each time I’m planning on writing and each time, my writing becomes a stand-up comedy routine. I’ve learned to write when (a) they are not home or (b) they are asleep. :)

I’ve been noticing a few discussions on the Yahoo boards about the necessity of a Happily Ever After ending in romance. Do you feel that HEA is needed to make romance romantic?

I like HEA endings and my books have them. I will tolerate a cliffhanger as to the romantic element if it is in a series and the author doesn’t drag out the HEA for the hero and heroine too long. JD Robb had it about perfect with Roarke and Eve – they meet in the first book, by the end of the second they are engaged, and in the third they get married. My kind of pacing. So, yes, I think HEA is a part of romantic romance.

If there isn’t an HEA then, in my opinion, it is mainstream or fits into another genre. For example, there is a mystery series I am reading by Julia Spencer-Fleming, and her hero and heroine are star-crossed lovers. Heroine is an Episcopalian priest. Hero is the local police chief. You know from the first mystery they solve that these two should be together. They are meant-to-be! But he is married, and they both have high morals and ethics. Yes, the hero is somewhat distant from his wife – they have grown apart – but he still loves her. Yet, he loves the priest, too (he admits that out loud in Book Three).

I know Julia, and she told me that she plans on writing an 8-book series. By the end of the 8-book series, the attraction between the two will be resolved one way or another.

Personally, I’m holding out for the chief’s wife to die a lingering death or to be kidnapped and the chief fails to save her. Then he can mourn for one whole book before jumping into bed and having monkey sex with the priest. :) Can’t help it, I have to have my characters tied up neatly with an HEA bow!

But Julia, damn her!, just smiles and won’t tell me what’s gonna happen. She is evil that woman. There is a LOT of romantic tension between the H/H, but are the books romance? No. Instead, they depict interpersonal relationships in a realistic way. And, as we all know, real life is messy. Romance novels, however, tie everything up with that nice little HEA bow and leave us feeling good, not frustrated. And there is nothing wrong with that. There is enough “real” in real life that we don’t need to face it in our reading too!

And, if you’re reading this, Julia, your books are really, really good, but I am so frustrated. I want the chief to marry the priest!

Could you please tell us a bit about your books that are out now?

My current Monette Michaels’ release is The Case of the Virtuous Vampire from LTDBooks. This book is the first in the paranormal mystery series I mentioned above. Abbie Gooden is a witch-lawyer who handles unusual cases that the preternatural community of Austin, Texas bring to her. In this book, Abbie takes the case of Jurnik Golub, a vampire who owns a “gentlemen’s” club on 6th Street in Austin. One of his strippers has been found dead, lying on the center stage of the club. He’s afraid that the police will look upon him as a suspect since he’d dated the dead dancer. He’s also fighting a wrongful death lawsuit filed by the dancer’s opportunistic parents. He hires Abbie to handle the legal stuff and chooses Lucan Knight, a shape shifter/private detective, to find out who really killed the girl. Luc and Abbie end up working all aspects of the case together – and falling in love.

Treading the Labyrinth, written as Rae Morgan, is the third book in the Coven of the Wolf series. It tells the story of Igor Petrov, one of the twin shape shifters from the first two books, and how he finds his mate in the Smokey Mountains of Tennessee. His fated mate is Selena, a shaman whose unique abilities have been damaged by an attack. She moved to Bear Hollow to escape and heal. With Igor’s love, she heals - - and finds the strength to once again survive an attack by evil. This book also introduces the other twin’s destined mate, and the story of Boris Petrov and Sheriff Debby Teague will be told in the next Coven book, No Secrets, due out in early 2006.

Do you have anything new in the works? If so, can we maybe get a sneak peek?

I mentioned No Secrets, Book Four in the Coven of the Wolf series. This will also be part of Liquid Silver Book’s Zodiac series (Pisces).

I am currently writing another Gooden & Knight mystery entitled The Case of the Ungrateful Child. In this book, Abbie’s uncle, Vidal Storm, witnesses the murder of a woman he cares for deeply at a séance he is conducting in her home. The police rule it an accidental death, but Vidal knows she was murdered by one of the people in the room. But how was she killed? And why? Vidal asks Abbie to help by using her empathic abilities (although she usually can’t “read” mere-mortals, evil has a certain aura that is unmistakable no matter who bears it). Abbie, Vidal and Luc soon find out that everyone in the room had a motive to kill the woman. Eventually, they will figure out who and how – but proving it for the mere-mortal justice system will turn out to be quite thorny – and potentially deadly to the investigators.

Oh, and don’t let the title throw you - the solution to the mystery is not that straightforward!

In September, I will have a novella entitled “Evanescence” in the LTDBooks’ anthology Nightfall. My anthology mates will be Angelique Armae and JC Wilder. Needless to say I am very excited to be in an anthology with these two very talented ladies. All three novellas will be dark, paranormal suspense, very sexy, and deal in some way with “nightfall.” We got to choose the way, so my hero is like The Shadow. He blends into the night in a mist-like shadowy form. He feels because of his freakish nature that he is doomed to live his life alone until he meets the woman who can love him for what he is.

Thanks again for letting us in on your secrets.

Thanks, Serena, for having me.

If you’re interested in learning more about Monette’s books, you can visit her websites at http://home.att.net/~medraper and www.raemorgan.com. To purchase her books, take a look at Fictionwise, eBookIsle, eBookad and other online booksellers.


Interviewed by: Serena