Janet evanovich blends romance, crime and wit in ‘going rogue’ | members only access

Evanovich began her creative life in the visual arts as a painter and sculptor. She graduated from Douglass as an art major and later married her mathematician husband, Peter. They had two

children, prompting Evanovich’s decision to become a stay-at-home mom. “We didn’t have a whole lot of money,” she says. “So every now and then, the credit cards would all be run up, and I’d

be down at the supermarket kiting checks because we were a little behind on payday.” At the time, Evanovich was struggling with her painting but realized she liked telling herself stories to

complement what she was doing visually — whether painting or coloring with her daughter. “That was the aha moment,” she says. “I thought, Wow, maybe I should try telling the stories instead

of painting them.” With no real writing background, she began teaching herself how to write, and since she was a fan of Regency romance novels, she started there. “It’s where I was at that

time in my life. I was a young mom and a young wife. I was in love with my husband,” she says. “I loved the positiveness of romance, the positive characters. I loved the values that were

espoused in it. This was before _Fifty_ _Shades_, and things were a little bit more gentle.” For nearly a decade, Evanovich honed her craft, but she was getting nowhere in the industry,

pitching agents and publishers and getting rejected. “It was a really hard time,” she says. “And then when the credit card would get maxed out, I would have to go take a part-time job —

telephone solicitor, sell used cars for a week, whatever I could do to make enough money to pay off the credit card — and then I’d go back to being a full-time mom and trying to write

books.” Finally, around 1980, she sold her first book, _Hero_ _at_ _Large_, for $2,000, “and it just changed my life.” Ten more romance novels followed, but over time Evanovich “just needed

more” from her writing. “I kept starting to incorporate little mysteries into my romances, and my editors would always rip them out,” she says. She took a leap of faith and penned a

full-fledged mystery novel, but instead of leaving the romance behind, she decided to take it with her. “I found a hole in the marketplace,” she says. “I brought in my Jersey girl and shoved

her into a Robert Parker novel.” When she got the call that _One_ _for_ _the_ _Money_, her first Stephanie Plum book, was going to be published, she was living in Northern Virginia. “It was

something like 9 o’clock at night, and my agent called and told me that I just sold _One_ _for_ _the_ _Money_, and that it went for $1 million,” Evanovich says.