Written by: Catherine Plato
High school English teacher by day and
romance writer by night, C.C. Saint-Clair has been
turning on the ladies of her Australian homeland for
years with her steamy prose. Saint-Clair’s social
realist leanings have earned her work the reputation of
“the thinking lesbian woman’s romance.” Born to French
parents in Casablanca and educated in Texas, Saint-Clair
calls Brisbane home these days. Her most recent novel,
Morgan in the Mirror, is the story of a
Australian FTM who falls in love midway through his
transition. Upon its publication last February, Morgan
elicited strong reactions of every sort from readers,
and is now in the process of its own transition into a
screenplay. Why weren’t my high school teachers ever
this cool?
Q&A:
Do your students
know that you’re also a lesbian romance novelist?
I’ve been teaching in the same inner-city high
school in Brisbane, Australia, for the past 10 years.
Chunky boots, six-gauge lobe plugs, spiky salt ’n’
pepper hair and the rather large wrist tattoo of a pink
orchid — semiotics that I’ve chosen to attach to myself
— keep the rumor mill humming among some groups of
students. Although I’ve outed myself to the principal,
both as a dyke and as a writer of lesbian romance, the
local political climate where I live in the state of
Queensland is just not conducive to an outright public
disclosure either to parents or to students in regards
to what I do after hours. What I deplore the most is
that, though we are five or six gays and lesbians on
staff, we cannot be actively involved with the welfare
of the students who identify as GLBT. I have, however,
put my hand up to be a part of the first queer health
cell to be set up in our school.
You’ve lived
in several different parts of the world, and yet your
stories all feature Australian main characters. Was it a
conscious decision to focus on the Australian
experience?
The Australian experience has
been my reality since 1981 and it has led to the
conscious decision to spell my novels in
Australian-British English, though I was educated in the
United States. A flow-on from that was the conscious
decision to set the best part of each plot within the
city of Brisbane and its surroundings, though the
characters are not necessarily Australian, as is the
case with Alex, Emilie and Solange, who are French.
Having said that, my transcontinental past works
beautifully as triggers for my characters’ exotic
out-of-the-moment experiences. Most of their flashbacks,
dream sequences and unresolved circumstances are set
overseas.
Which novel are you most proud
of?
I can’t say that I am more or less proud
of any particular novel, but I often say that my novels
are like so many children and because I have hatched
seven in four years, I do feel like a sole parent who
needs to be actively involved with all of them,
separately and collectively. I do not have a favorite
novel, though the most recent, at any given point in
time, is the one that requires sustained attention and
energy, particularly post-launch. I am very proud of
North and Left From Here [TakeII], my first novel. It
has set me on the path I am traveling today.
Which of your characters do you identify with
most strongly?
A reader once told me that
while reading North and Left, there were times when she
wanted to shake Alex to make her more proactive in her
love pursuits. I can relate to that. There has been many
a moment when I should have shaken myself, too, when I
was Alex’s age.
How and when did you begin
publishing your own books?
I almost gave up
on the idea of seeing anything of mine published back in
2001, after the mandatory three-chapter selections were
returned, unread, by three of the leading
feminist/lesbian publishing houses. … I’m a Leo, so
patience is not my forte. I gave myself a choice: either
give up the dream or fund my own adventure. I chose the
latter and have never looked back. In the process, I
have learnt that when you have a dream, regardless of
what the maxim says, you have to do a lot more than
merely follow it. You have to bust a gut, again and
again. You have to go out on many limbs before you can
hope to make it happen. Just when I think I might run
out of puff and give up, I get a flurry of heart-warming
mail or come across posts from total strangers who
explain they found such and such a plot too intense to
read in one gulp and yet impossible to put down. Or that
a plot pushed buttons they weren’t aware they had.
Would you work with a larger publisher in the
future, or does the freedom of self-publishing outweigh
the benefits?
Technically, I do not
self-publish my books. What I do is produce them in
collaboration with Book Makers Ink very much like a
musician might produce a CD under her own label. I
haven’t regretted putting some of my hard-earned cash
behind one project after the other, though this path is
a lonely one to travel. Editors and reviewers on whom I
totally depend for exposure tend to shy away from
anything that has not come through the established
channels. They do reply very politely that they do not
cover self-published works — a blinkered attitude which
only reinforces the status quo. How will alternative,
quality publishing ever get buzzed if our mind-shapers
only walk the same old, dated but familiar path? … I am
very much a one-woman band when it comes to marketing my
novels on a now spaghetti-thin shoestring budget — my
Web site and word of mouth are the only tools I have at
my disposal. However, now that the big expenses involved
with setting up seven novels are behind me, now that the
books are out there and are being read, I can
acknowledge the enjoyment of casting characters and
circumstances in total creative freedom.
Morgan in the Mirror has caused a bit
of controversy among transgendered readers who think
that, as a non-trans woman, you don’t have the authority
to tell Morgan’s story.
When I introduced
Morgan to various TG newsgroups and webmasters,
pre-launch, I did cop a few flames … I have also
received criticism from disgruntled readers who felt
betrayed by moments of intimacy between a “freak who
thinks she’s a man and a screwed-up female cop.” To make
matters worse for these readers, knowing that the FTM
condition is a gendered one, not a sexual one, I chose
to have Morgan identify as straight. … Actually, the FTM
community, as opposed to the wider TG community, has
been extremely supportive. The webmasters behind the FTM
International and FTM Australia sites were quick to add
Morgan to their bookshelves, and some individuals
have referenced it on their personal Web sites, while
others post heartwarming testimonials. My absolute
favorite feedback to date came from a young FTM who said
that, as an intro to the difficult disclosure he had yet
to have with his new girlfriend, the day came when he
sat her down on the sofa with the book opened at the
scene where Morgan discloses to Christen. When the young
woman had finished reading and looked up, all he said to
her was, “I am like Morgan.”
What are you
working on these days?
I have put writing
the next novel on hold until the word of mouth spins
more widely the titles that are already out there. I
need to concentrate on finding more and more promotional
pathways, alleyways and avenues. That, and connecting
with a producer who will take Maddy and
Morgan to the big screen … keeps me tied to my
keyboard and out of mischief.
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