An interview with Anna Cowan
One of the highlights of my reading life last month was diving into The Duke by Anna Cowan, a sumptuous sapphic historical romance set in an alternate history where women can inherit noble titles and wield power in Regency England. Three years after a night of passion, courtesan Celine Genet flees the dangers of revolutionary Paris and arrives in London to strike a bargain with the powerful and dangerous Kate, Duke of Howard: Kate will find Celine a husband and Celine will give Kate the dangerous letter that threatens to reveal Kate’s darkest secret. I was absolutely mesmerized by this book, my heart in my throat as I wondered how Celine and Kate could possibly find their way to a happy ending. The Duke reads like a queer version of the high-stakes classic historical romances that first helped me fall in love with the genre and that I fell in love with all over again when I embarked on my romance history reading project last year. I’d been craving this kind of energy in my reading life and I’d highly, highly recommend The Duke if you have been too.
I reached out to Anna Cowan to see if she’d be willing to answer some questions and she graciously agreed. I loved getting to hear about her inspiration, her writing process, and what’s next for her.
Natalie: Can you talk about your initial inspiration for The Duke and how the idea evolved as you wrote?
Anna Cowan: I was being plagued by a female character who thought she was the heir to a duke. I told her she couldn’t be. She insisted that she was. Once I accepted her point of view it became clear she wasn’t simply the heir to a duke – she was the duke. No one that autocratic was going to stand in someone else’s shadow.
This led me to think about what makes a romance hero compelling. It’s not his physical hotness, because all characters in a romance are physical hot. It’s the idea of him. A conceptual hotness. This comes from him being, among other things: politically powerful, sexually aggressive, physically imposing and in possession of a tragic backstory.
None of these qualities are inherently male, except for the way we equate power with masculinity. I wanted to see if I could embody them in a woman.
N: Was there a particularly interesting historical tidbit you uncovered or research rabbit hole you went down while writing it?
AC: Researching prostitutes in Revolutionary Paris was pretty eye-opening. My base knowledge of the French Revolution comes from high school history and whatever I’ve absorbed from the culture, so I was starting from the assumption that it was an egalitarian movement. But it turns out women were well and truly left out. They couldn’t be political, or martial; they couldn’t write pamphlets, or plays; they couldn’t receive welfare and they couldn’t beg. Like, what is a woman to do?!
I came across an anecdote I loved, which made it into The Duke. The new police commissioner was conducting his first raid on the brothels of Paris. A prostitute named Marguerite Prieur answered the door and he asked her, “What do you do?” She replied, “Everyone.” (Tout le monde.) Incredible.
N: I loved this way this novel depicts the different ways Kate and Celine wield power and the spiky chemistry between them. Which character came to you first and what was your favorite thing about writing each of them?
AC: Kate came first, with Celine pretty close on her heels. Once I knew I was writing a classic haughty duke, a prostitute suggested herself as the furthest point from that. There’s a class taboo inherent in their relationship, and because Celine has come from Revolutionary France there’s a political taboo as well. That’s a lot of conflict on page right from the get-go!
In every draft Celine was a joy to write. I was moved by her desire to live, against all the odds. Where Kate locks herself away, fearing she’s a monster, Celine wants to live to the fullest at every moment, to “suck down every last sweet drop, and then grind the dry remainder between her teeth and swallow that down as well”.
The best part about writing Kate was…her thighs. Seriously, writing a woman that hot just kind of melted my brain. There’s an interaction in the horror-romance Feast While You Can by Onjuli Datta and Mikaella Clements where a man is congratulating his lesbian cousin on not feeling she has to “look like a man”, like the town dyke does. The lesbian snorts and says, “I’d love to see the man who managed to look like she does.” Yes.
N: One of my favorite parts of The Duke was your lush, vivid prose. What’s a scene or a passage that you’re particularly proud of or that was a joy to write?
AC: It’s a bit on the nose, but there’s a line that delights me so much. Celine is looking across the room at Kate at a social event and she’s having this horny fantasy of making Kate kiss her shoe in front of everyone. She’s brought back to reality by the woman she’s in conversation with – a countess with whom she’s playing the innocent debutante. The countess asks if she’s alright and she responds, “Forgive me, I had a queer turn.” Very queer indeed, lol.
Can I also pause here and say: Hannah Bristow did a phenomenal job reading the book. The audiobook bangs. The scene where Celine finally tells Kate everything that happened to her in Paris after Kate left her there made me cry, even though I literally wrote those words!
N: What romance novel first led you to fall in love with the genre and what titles do you think The Duke is in conversation with?
AC: In my final year at Melbourne Uni I read so many romances – almost exclusively historicals. My husband had just opened a café, an incredibly stressful undertaking, and I basically spent a year being his housekeeper/roommate. I made up the difference with romance novels. (I’m being facetious, but it’s not not true.)
The student union library, the Rowden White, had the most amazing collection of romance paperbacks, and I would just borrow like ten at a time and keep them in a stack by my bed. I would finish one, sigh the sigh of the emotionally replete, and then immediately pick up the next one.
The names that remain with me from that time are Gaelen Foley, Julie Anne Long, Eloisa James, Julia Quinn and Loretta Chase. Later, I obsessively read all of Sherry Thomas and Meredith Duran. Later still I came to Judith Ivory, who I think exists on a god-tier all by herself.
More than any modern queer romance, The Duke is in conversation with these older historicals.
N: What’s a romance (or two) you’ve read and loved lately?
AC: In Memoriam by Alice Winn floored me. I’m normally repelled by anything world-war-ish – it’s at once too big and too overdone. But she made me care about it, deeply. The pragmatic way she depicts the front worked so well, and these two longing boys are coming towards each other through that brutal landscape.
I also loved Good Boy by Carey Sass. It’s a gen-z coming-of-age romance in which Judd’s interactions with his phone are an inextricable part of his internal landscape. Videos of the war in Gaza sit alongside a bus ride, his anxious response to difficult emotions is to monitor the high-fashion sweater he has his eye on, and a notification from his mum is a clanging intrusion into his porn consumption. It’s hilarious, lonely and incredibly well-written.
N: No worries if you’re not able to speak about this yet, but is there a possibility we might get more books in this universe? (I’m fervently hoping for a Royce story!)
AC: Royce is coming next, of course! Her book is already under contract and will most likely be out early 2028 (I’m sorry, I’m such a slow writer, boo). She’s been a pain in the arse to write, but also the most fun I’ve ever had on page. She’s an absolute romp. She’s a mess. She’s…a lot in bed. The story is rake/spinster and boy oh boy is that spinster uptight. Let’s just say she literally shrieks the first time Royce kisses her somewhere she probably shouldn’t.
Ed. note: The joy I felt, knowing that we’re getting a Royce story! She’s Kate’s cousin, a dissolute rake with a heart of gold buried deep down, and I love a lady rake.
Thank you so much to Anna for answering my questions! You can find The Duke on Bookshop.org and on bookstore shelves now.
Currently reading: By the Bootstraps by Alexa Martin, a sparkly small-town romance with a bit of cowboy flair.
Recommendations, miscellany, and little bits of joy:
The heat finally broke last weekend and we went for an excellent walk along the Brooklyn waterfront, including gazing at some impressively tall ships.
Getting to properly make the acquaintance of our friends’ new-ish cat, who very patiently sat by my shoulder and allowed me to pet him.
Discovering Split Eights, a super cute cocktail bar tucked into a side street in the Financial District.
