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Lavinia and William
© Tintin Pantoja.
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Lavinia
© Tintin Pantoja.
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Christmas trappings
Q. Why did you choose to write a Christmas story that avoids most of the trappings of a Regency Christmas?
A. There are no kissing boughs or trips to the forest to get mistletoe in This Wicked Gift. I asked a handful of friends to read the original version for me, and the one thing they universally said was “NEEDS MOAR CHRISTMAS!”
So I added in a little music and the scents of Christmas pastry.
The one thing I slipped in there to try and give it a Christmas-y feel was repeated references to the libretto from Handel’s Messiah—something that my parents would play as soon as our Christmas tree went up, and one of my strongest associations with the Christmas season.
I was trying to be subtle about it, but apparently I was a little too subtle, because now I can’t find all the references. The only one I can say for sure is a Messiah-reference is this:
“You?” The solicitor laughed in scorn. “Well, trust in yourself, then. You’ll not deliver yourself from poverty.”
Which is a reference to:
“All they that see him laugh him to scorn: they shoot out their lips, they shake their heads, saying: He trusted in God that he would deliver him: let him deliver him, if he delight in him.”
—Handel’s Messiah, No. 27
Yeah, that one was probably a little too oblique. What can I say? I was a relatively new author. I thought I was being clever. Woooo. Look at me, making literary allusions that even I can’t catch.
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The best things in life are free
Q. The value of love versus more material things is a pretty classic Christmas theme. Did you conceive of a hero and heroine so mired in questions of poverty and wealth specifically for that purpose or did it take shape later on?
A. I had planned to write this story before my publisher asked me to do it. I had intended it to be a free short story to promote the release of my first book. I hadn’t imagined it as a Christmas book at all.
So the line in the book about the best things being free was there as a sort of a subtle nod to what I had planned—that the story would be free, and that you could get good things (I hoped the story would be good) at no cost. That line—and the inkling of the plot—arose from the distinction between the things that were available for purchase (when the characters had no money) and the things you could get for free.
Then Harlequin asked me to participate in the anthology and told me, oh, by the way, it’s a Christmas story. So the Christmas-theme aspects of it were not initially intended by me.
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The story arc
Q. William spends a lot of the story considering himself morally bankrupt as a reaction to his station in life. In the end, when he has decided to value his own honor, he happens into a way to raise his station in life. Was this intended to be a karmic thing, or was it just coincidence resulting from the necessary resolution of the story?
A. I never intend karmic things. That would imply that people (generally) get what they deserve, and unfortunately, they don’t. The world is an awful place.
This was actually more a question of necessity: the story, even though it was published before Proof by Seduction, was written afterwards. I had been directed to write something that would be a prequel tie-in, and there was literally only one couple who was married and appeared (well, at least half of them appeared) in Proof by Seduction.
So I knew I needed Gareth in the story of This Wicked Gift, and I knew I wanted to end the story with William White working for Gareth. This was how I managed it.
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Acknowledgments
This novella, appearing in an anthology, originally had no space for acknowledgments. So here I am, five years later, finally acknowledging the people who helped me.
Tessa Dare, Carey Baldwin, and Franzeca Drouin were all extremely helpful.
The Northwest Pixies came through in my hour of need and read this novella on extremely short notice—Kris Kennedy, Darcy Burke, Tatia Talbot, and Rachel Grant all read this and discussed the ending, the middle, and the beginning. Without them, I would never have had any edits at all.
This was my first published work, and the response from readers was amazing. If you read This Wicked Gift in its original inception, and cared about it… Thank you so much. The beginning of an author’s career is often the shakiest part. I would never have made it off the ground it without your enthusiasm. Thank you, thank you, thank you.
This enhanced edition wouldn’t have been possible without Kristin Nelson, my wonderful agent, who negotiated a contract that allowed me to make this edition. Rawles wrote the questions for the Q & A. Finally, Gwen Hayes and Liz Pelletier at Entangled helped make distribution of this version possible. Thank you.
Copyright
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
This Wicked Gift: © 2009 by Courtney Milan.
Enhanced content: © 2014 by Courtney Milan and Rawles Lumumba.
Cover design © Courtney Milan.
Cover photographs © Anteromite, Subbotina Anna, Malyugin, and manifeesto | shutterstock.com.
Enhanced Edition 1.0
All rights reserved. Where such permission is sufficient, the author grants the right to strip any DRM which may be applied to this work.
The rights to publish and distribute the unenhanced text of this book are currently held by Harlequin Enterprises, S.A.; the unenhanced text was originally published in The Heart of Christmas, an anthology.
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