While attending last summer’s Romance Writers of America convention, Nora Roberts added a series of press interviews to her busy schedule. In addition to an appearance on Orlando’s WKMG-TV, she participated in telephone conversations with reporters from the New Zealand Herald and from Australia’s Herald Sun. The Herald Sun interview was just published yesterday, November 27, 2010 (Australian time).
Unlike the New Zealand Herald article, which focused on Roberts’ professional life, Blanche Clark’s “The $60 million woman: Nora Roberts” centers on Roberts' personal history. Despite the title Clark gives her article – which reflects a 2004 Forbes magazine estimate of Roberts gross annual income – Clark presents Roberts as a “humble 60-year-old grandmother, who lives on a country property in Maryland.”
Roberts tells Clark that she does enjoy some of the consequences wealth has brought her, including Armani clothes and family trips to exotic locations. However, she adds that she does not believe that money has fundamentally changed her. “I didn't have this much money when I started out. It's very nice, but basically I live the same life, more or less on a daily basis," she says.
Clark provides a short biography of Roberts’ life, from her birth in 1950 through her marriage at age 17 to Ronald Aufdem-Brinke and the birth of their two sons, Dan and Jason. Clark also recounts the “legendary” story of the blizzard of February 1979 that started Roberts on her writing career. Roberts’ divorce from Aufdem-Brinke and her subsequent marriage to Bruce Wilder is mentioned as well.
Politically, Clark describes Roberts as “left-wing Liberal Democrat, who is ‘totally’ behind President Barack Obama.” She adds that Roberts also enjoys gardening and confesses to one “guilty pleasure.” Roberts admits, "I love television. . . . I love Justified (a series about a US marshal), I loved Lost, The Closer. I love The Mentalist, Glee, big Glee fan. I could go on and on.”
Near the end of the interview, the conversation turns to Roberts’ writing. Roberts reiterates her defense of the romance genre as a whole, which she believes is too often belittled due to misconceptions about the content of these works:
They think they are all about naked pirates or whatever; they don't realise that a lot of us grew up on fairytales, but we did not grow up waiting for the prince and the pumpkin. Women are not idiots. We know the difference between reality and fiction, but we need to look for someone who compliments us, who we love, who treats us with respect and affection.
Of her own books in particular, Roberts voices her hope that her works not only give enjoyment to her readers, but also help them endure difficult experiences. "If reading one of my books has made it easier for them to get through cancer treatment, divorce or the death of a loved one, then that's such a tremendous compliment," she says.
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