Interview with Anna Romer - author of The Ghost of Briar Rose.
Interview with Anna Romer - author of The Ghost of Briar Rose.
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About Anna:
She is an internationally bestselling Australian author of mystery and romance, both historical and contemporary, with paranormal elements - ghosts, haunted houses, and fairytales - woven into the mix. She lives by the ocean in beautiful North Eastern Australia and when she’s not writing, she’s gardening, knitting, bushwalking and finding ways to preserve and protect the environment.
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INTERVIEW
What is the inspiration behind The Ghost of Briar Rose and please provide an overview of the story?
One winter I rented a tiny cottage on a hill station called Ard Choille (pronounced Arda Hillier). The historic garden covered a sprawling 15 acres, nestled on a mountainside and hidden from the outside world. William McGregor, the original owner back in the 1890s, constructed the garden to remind him of his childhood home in Scotland— even building a cottage for his own bagpipe player – which is where I lived.
Just up the hill from my cottage sat a magnificent iron fern house, believed to be the only one of its kind in Australia. Further up the slope lurked a shady man-made loch with the remnants of a small rowboat bobbing on its black waters. It was beautiful, but for some reason, it always gave me the chills.
One bitterly cold day, my historian friend visited me. As we walked around the garden, we noticed it didn’t look anything like Scotland. So we started wondering what had really inspired William McGregor to build it. My friend declared that creating such a wild and magical place could only have been a passionate labour of love. We brainstormed a ton of possible scenarios – a tragic love story, a betrayal, maybe even a murder.
Later, I couldn’t stop thinking about it. That night I dreamed of a man standing at my window. He was wearing a WW1 soldier’s uniform and gazing outside into the snow as if waiting for someone to show up.
When I woke, I scribbled some notes and got quite obsessed. I wrote heaps of fragments, sitting in the shade house under the giant ferns with my notebook. The garden crept into my story – the ferns and spooky loch and little cottage – but the plot kept refusing to lay itself bare for me. So like the man at the window, I waited. It took sixteen years! But then Rose's story tumbled out in a few months and I absolutely loved writing it.
Australia, 1914. Rose is locked away in a back room, considered a monster by her father. But when the new gardener arrives and glimpses the girl Rose believes herself to be on the inside, she decides to take a chance on love—with devastating consequences.
A hundred years later, Rose is now haunting the beautiful old mountainside garden, keeping the world at bay to protect her dark secrets. For ghost hunter Cleary Branchwood, getting rid of her seems like just another easy payday. But Rose is determined to unravel the mystery of her death and clear her name of a horrifying crime.
As they join forces to unearth Rose's tragic past and set her free, they must also confront their growing feelings for each other. Could Cleary and his young daughter be the family Rose has always yearned for?
But with each step closer to the truth, Rose fears that the monster lying dormant inside her will destroy not only her chance at love, but also the lives of those she cares for most.
What are your major literary influences and how have you drawn upon them for your latest novel?
I was a huge fan of Catherine Cookson who wrote historical fiction. Her details about working-class life in Edwardian England swept me away. Then I discovered Diana Gabaldon’s Outlander series, and couldn’t get enough! So when I started writing my own novels, I found that slipping back into a historical viewpoint came very naturally to me.
Anne Rice was also a huge influence. I loved her rich world building and intensely emotional characters. Her supernatural stories seemed to emerge from between the cracks of our own world, with intricate history and characters who felt real to me, as if they might actually exist. Since childhood I loved reading anything with ghosts, vampires, werewolves and witches – especially if it involved some history – such as origin stories or made-up folklore.
When I first started writing professionally I was encouraged to lean into commercial women’s fiction, as that’s what was selling really well back then. Meanwhile, I was secretly longing to write stories with supernatural and fantasy elements paired with intense, juicy romances and angsty historical viewpoints.
In The Ghost of Briar Rose, I combined all this with a love story – between a ghost and a ghost hunter. There are chapters that flashback to Rose's life in 1917, as she and Cleary try to solve the mystery of Rose's death.
It unfolded very naturally for me. I think it’s opened a Pandora’s box, because once I finished writing, I felt inspired to venture deeper into supernatural territory. I've started writing a series set in a small town revolving around a mysterious, haunted forest.
Tell us about Cleary? Who is he and what challenges must he overcome in the novel?
Cleary is a big gruff cinnamon roll of a guy – a ghost hunter who buys haunted houses and flips them for profit. He’s a protective single dad, whose 9-year-old daughter is also a skilled ghost hunter. Cleary knows that learning the ropes will keep his daughter safe, but he also fears her getting too involved with the entities they hunt, and being hurt by them. He does not like or trust ghosts at all!
When he meets Rose, his distrust begins to fall away. He sees her vulnerable side and it makes him want to keep her safe – rather than banish her. But as Rose’s tragic past emerges, Cleary is torn between giving Rose a chance, and his need to protect his daughter.
What is both unique and heartbreaking about Rose in The Ghost of Briar Rose?
Without giving too much away, Rose believes herself to be disfigured and was influenced in a very negative way by her father because of it. Her father called her a monster, and treated her appallingly. As a sensitive young girl, she took his cruelty to heart and lost all faith in herself.
When she fell in love at nineteen, she thought her life was changing for the better – but fate stepped in and now she has a broken heart on top of everything else. What makes her most unique is her resilience to what’s happened to her, and her drive to fight back. Despite everything, she never gives up hope that one day true love will find her.
What is the main theme or message of the novel that you hope readers discover?
The central idea is all about accepting ourselves and those around us. Making peace with the things we think make us unlovable. It's about learning to let go of what we can't change and looking beyond someone's surface to truly understand who they are as a person.
What was the hardest scene to write in The Ghost of Briar Rose and what did you do to overcome the obstacle?
The first chapter was toughest for me craft-wise. At the beginning of a story, readers aren't yet emotionally invested, so you have to hook them in. I knew I wanted to start with Rose alone in the garden, and show how she’s tormented by the past. But in the beginning I didn’t know her all that well. So I wrote a placeholder scene and came back to it later when the full story was clear in my mind.
Then I had to dream up a catchy opening line. Maybe the hardest thing of all! Luckily for me, I happened to see a documentary about Taylor Swift, and one of her songs inspired my opening lines!
The showdown at the end of the book was also hard to write – emotionally. It's the ultimate face-off, where Rose's secrets are revealed and her feelings are laid bare. As I wrote this scene, I had to feel every bit of angst and love that I'd poured into the story up to this point. I needed Rose’s final realisation about the past to be hugely cathartic for the reader, and emotionally satisfying for them too. To do this properly, I had to get myself into a heightened emotional state. I ended up blubbering and wrecked while writing this scene. Whoever said magic always comes with a price described it perfectly.
Please provide a summary of your writing/publishing journey as an author?
My first novel Thornwood House was published by Simon & Schuster in 2013 and became an instant bestseller. It was in the top three bestselling debut novels in Australia that year. It sold in a bidding war to German publisher Goldmann, and became a bestseller in Germany and France. I wrote three more bestselling novels with Simon and Schuster, then when the pandemic hit in 2020 and publishing slowed to a crawl, I started learning how to publish independently.
I’d always found the traditional route very stressful, so indie seemed like a good fit for me. It took me years to figure out what to do – and I’m still learning!
In traditional publishing you stick to a rigid schedule of putting out a book every one or two years. The process from finished book to seeing it on the bookshop shelves is super slow! For someone with a bottom drawer full of novels that I was itching to finish and get out to my readers, it was excruciating.
The trad culture also strongly encourages a writer to pick a genre and stay with it. Which makes sense in a slow moving industry. But I love filling my stories with elements of other genres – historical mystery, romance, even fantasy!
I really enjoyed writing women’s fiction, but I wanted to play around with the supernatural elements that I loved reading – ghosts, werewolves etc. And timeslip stories. Maybe I’ll even pop in a vampire one day! That’s the joy of publishing independently and having your own online bookshop. I can pretty much write the stories in my heart, the ones that wake me up at night demanding to be told. I've been lucky that my amazing readers seem to take it all in their stride.
If you could give your younger self some writing advice, what would it be?
“Stop thinking that you can’t do this. Stop listening to people who say you’ll never make it. And stop writing what others say you should be writing. Just escape into those big, epic love stories that you’re longing to write and ignore everyone and everything else.”
What types of books do you like to read? Do you have a favourite genre? Can you share at least three titles you have read in 2024 that are high on your most loved list?
I love dark romance and especially romantic fantasy. This year I've been getting into ghost romances to keep me focused while I wrote The Ghost of Briar Rose, and some standouts were Layla by Colleen Hoover, and Pen Pal by J.T. Geissinger. Another great read was Annie Seaton’s From Across the Sea – not a ghost story, but there’s history and mystery, and her Australian setting really sings.
If you could go back in time to meet an author or historical figure, who would it be and what three questions would you ask her/him?
I would definitely love to meet Genghis Khan, and of course Cleopatra! But perhaps a walk on the moors with shy Emily Bronte would be a safer option. I’d quiz her about the origins of her novel Wuthering Heights. There’s so much angst and intensity in her writing that those emotions must have bubbled up from somewhere inside her. I’d love to try and figure out what makes her tick!
It’s thought that Heathcliff was based on the adoptive grandfather of Emily’s brother Patrick. The old man was found as an urchin boy and grew into a mean and bitter adult, just like the fictional Heathcliff. Can you imagine sitting around the family dinner table, the stories they must have told?
Emily never married, and there is some speculation about her love life, but nothing confirmed. I would definitely have to ask about that!
Who did you love and why didn’t you marry them?
What actual (probably very unsavoury) stories about your grandfather inspired the novel?
Heathcliff is tormented by Cathy’s ghost – was there a ghost from your past who haunted you?
Share your greatest dream as an author.
Authors have all sorts of wild and wonderful dreams – hitting bestseller lists, making a good living from our books, reaching adoring readers worldwide. I have those too, but for me the most rewarding thing in the world (aside from finishing a novel!) is when my readers tell me how a book I've written has touched their hearts. When they say things like “I’ve read the new one three times and time stops completely. I just can’t stop reading” – well, wow. I’m kind of speechless with joy. My readers are so loyal and kind to me, and they inspire me every day. My greatest dream is to keep writing books they love.
Are you writing any new projects that you can share a little about?
I’m working on a novella – which is the prequel to my upcoming haunted forest series. It’ll be a quick read, probably under two hours, but I’m obsessed! It’s a dark fairytale romance based on Red Riding Hood, set in a small remote town in Northern NSW. A bookish young artist falls for a man with a dark secret and is forced to confront some pretty dark secrets of her own! It’s so much fun. I’ve always wanted to write about wolf shifters, and I’m really looking forward to diving into the series.
Thanks so much, Anna, for being my guest author today! I wish you much success on your new novel and look forward to your upcoming novella! 😊
Visit Anna Romer’s website for more details on her gorgeous books.
