A historical novelist and lifelong history nut on the misplaced library book that launched her career, bringing real scandals to life, and why the research is the best part.

Diana Rubino found her life’s subject by accident: a book about Richard III shelved in the wrong place at her local library. Thirty years and a shelf of novels later, she is still mining real history for its drama.

In this conversation she talks about biographical fiction built entirely from real figures, the true scandals behind her books, and why, for a self-described history nut, the research is the best part of all.

Diana Rubino is a historical novelist based in Hudson, New Hampshire, who writes fiction about real figures including Richard III, Alexander Hamilton, and Aaron Burr, often with a paranormal twist. She has been a Richard III Society member for over thirty years.

She has published roughly eighteen books through small independent publishers, currently Wild Rose Press and Next Chapter Publishing, and runs a construction cost-estimating business with her husband Chris.

DISCUSS YOUR BOOK

Full transcript of the interview follows.

Richard Lowe: So okay, so 1, 2, 3, start. So, Hi, this is Richard Lowe. of the author talks podcast. And I’m interviewing Diana Rubino. She’s a historical author, she writes historical novels with generally with a paranormal twist, should be a very interesting conversation. So why don’t you tell us a little more about yourself, Diana?

Richard III and the Book on the Wrong Shelf

Diana Rubino: Okay, Richard. Well, thank you for inviting me and I started writing novels in the early eighties and didn’t get my 1st novel published until 1999. So it was a long road to publication. But I just kept churning them out and stuck with it. and I’m glad I did.

and I wrote my 1st historical novel about the court of Henry the 8, th because I’ve always been a huge tutor file ever since. I’m a kid. I made the acquaintance of Richard the 3, rd and I found a book about him on the wrong shelf in the Cambridge Public Library, and it seemed to be serendipitous because I was looking around for someone for the next subject to write about.

And here I found this book on the wrong shelf, and I I checked it out and I brought it home. It was about Richard the 3.rd It’s oh, I got to write about this guy. He’s fascinating. and he has a huge following. The Richard the 3rd Society, of which I’ve been a member for over 30 years, has thousands of members all over the world, and he just captures the imaginations of so many people.

so people. Everybody has a story about how they got acquainted with Richard, how they they either read this book or that book, or found, or the play, or they they met him somehow or other, and he does. He does capture a lot of people’s imaginations because there’s so much mystery associated.

So I wrote those 2, and then I wrote a few contemporary romances, and then I went back to writing historicals because I had a few other historical figures I wanted to write about. So I started writing biographical novels that don’t have any fictional characters. because a straight biography is extremely difficult to write.

I admire anybody who writes a biography of a factual biography. but you have to do a tremendous amount of research and meet several experts in the field, and it’s good to meet experts in the field when you’re writing fiction, too. But my 1st biographical novel, with no fictional characters, was about Alexander Hamilton, and when when I was researching him, I found out that He had an affair with a beautiful woman by the name of Maria Reynolds.

and it became a big scandal, and it became. Our country was very young at the time 1791, and it was the country’s 1st sex scandal. and it got exposed to the public. In this it helped to ruin his chances of the Presidency since when this became exposed. So I wrote my 1st biographical novel about him, and then, when I was researching him, I became acquainted with Aaron Burr.

Of course, you know Aaron Burke killed Hamilton in the duel. He was the Vice President at the time, and they had a duel and in which Hamilton was shot and killed, but And he fascinated me almost as much as Richard the 3.rd I just got so interested in Aaron Burr, and it turns out there’s an Aaron Burr Association which has at least a couple of 100 members, not as many as Richard the 3, rd but they have They have a few 100 members, and I joined the Aaron Burr Association.

I go to their meetings every year, and so I wrote my next book about it it. It was about him and his last wife, Eliza and Eliza, is a fascinating subject to research, because, even though there isn’t very much written about her. I managed to find a few biographies about Eliza.

but she grew up dirt poor in Providence, on the streets. Her mother was a prostitute, she became a prostitute. That was the only way she could make a living growing up. and she made her way to New York with a few pennies she had saved. and she worked her way at the top to the top of the business world just by her sheer street smarts and business acumen, with very little education, but she was a clever, wily lady.

and she eventually became the richest woman in New York City. She made all her money with real estate. and she married a wealthy merchant named Steven Jumel. She didn’t have to marry him for his money, because by then she was pretty well off. and she bought a mansion which still is still open to the public.

Today it’s in Harlem. and it’s called the Morris Jumel Mansion. So she bought it. It was called the Morris Mount Morris, actually, and then, when she bought it, she called it the Morris Jewel. because she wanted to combine her and her husband’s names. and then her husband. Steven, was killed in an accident, and she lived in the mansion for a few more years, but she had known Aaron Burr since she was a teenager.

So they knew each other for decades all throughout his political career, and he became vice President. And so she knew him all these decades. But if there was any kind of romance between the 2 of them, it’s not recorded in history. So as a fiction writer as a novelist.

Of course we take license. So I kind of made up a a romance between the 2 of them that went off in decades. But they. Circumstances just prevented them from, prevented them from getting married. He he was married, and she was married, and they were in different places and just logistics, and so they were never able to to get together and get married.

But one night she’s sitting in her her house with some of her family. She was 56 years old. Aaron Burr shows up at her doorstep with a minister in tow. He was 78. He came in, and he asked her to marry him that very night she married him.

So she became Mrs. Aaron Burr, and she always wanted a prestige. And so she there’s general belief that she married him because she wanted the prestige of his name, because. as a former vice President, you know, he had a lot of clout in the in in high society circles, and she just wanted his name.

So they weren’t married very long before he started blowing through her money. She was very wealthy, and he wasn’t very well off by this time. and she just got kind of fed up with it. And she said, Look, Aaron, money doesn’t grow on trees. I’m not a bottomless well of money he was.

He was buying expensive clothes and taking his friends out to dinner, and whining and dining them, and bought horses, and so So he blew through a significant amount of of her money. And and this is it, we’re we’re not gonna be able to make it so. After 2 years of marriage she hired her her neighbor as a divorce lawyer who happened to be Alexander Hamilton, Jr.

That was Alexander Hamilton’s son. He was a divorce lawyer. so she hired him to draw up divorce papers, and Aaron was living in Staten Island at the time he was 80 years old he wasn’t doing very well. He had a couple of strokes. and he got served with the papers signed by Alexander Hamilton, Jr.

And I can just imagine what his reaction he must have said Touche, Eliza Touche and he died the same day. Same day he was served. The papers. Yeah, 80 years old. She was 80. She was 56 lived until the 18 sixties. I believe she lived quite a long life. She was at least in her late eighties, early nineties. so.

Richard: Tell me a little bit about your background also.

From New Jersey to London and Back

Diana: Oh, my background. Okay? Well, I’m from New Jersey. Originally. And I went to London to work after I graduated college, and I wanted to. I just wanted to bum around Europe for a year or so, and just enjoy my my youth for a while. And so I went for a for a job interview, and this engineering company was hiring, and they hired me as a secretary.

I wasn’t looking for a career job. I just wanted to just wanted to draw a paycheck and just have fun. And and that’s where I met my husband at this engineering firm. and I brought him back to the United States. He became a Us. Citizen. and he carried on his career.

And as as an engineer, actually, it’s we call it construction cost estimating. We tell you what it’s gonna cost you to build something. So if you want to build a hospital, or a school, or any kind of facility or building. the architect designs the project and sends us the drawings, and we measure everything and count everything that goes into the building and draw up a cost estimate.

So that’s what we’ve been doing for 30 plus years. And we have. We have our own business. So Chris and I have been together since 1979.

Richard: Nice. And how many books have you published.

Independent Publishers Over the Majors

Diana: Oh, to be honest, I’ve lost count. I would have to say maybe 1718 19. Somewhere around there.

Richard: All traditional.

Diana: What was it?

Richard: All traditional publishing.

Diana: Oh, no! Actually, all the publishers who ever published me have been small, independent publishers.

Richard: Okay. Okay.

Diana: I came close with a few Major, romance publishers, Harlequinn and and a few others, but got rejected after a few back and forths, you know. The editors said, No, we can’t give it any more consideration, so we’re sorry. But they weren’t able to publish me. So I started going to a smaller publishers.

and my 1st publisher was a British publisher, and they published my first, st I would have to say 7 or 8 books. and then as the independent publishers started popping up. I mean, they’re all over the place now. There’s thousands of them out there all over the world.

and they started gaining quite a bit of traction. And these publishers have have been thriving, and the one I’m with now is, I have 2 publishers right now. One is called the Wild Roast Press. They’ve been around at least 15 years or so. and then my other publisher is called next Chapter Publishing and They’ve been thriving, and a lot of a lot of authors have had have had offers from.

They call them the Big 4. I think it is the 4 or the big, however many, the Big 5, however many the big publishers that are left, and they’ve turned them down just to either self, publish or go with an independent publisher, and a lot of them do a lot better believe it or not.

Richard: Interesting. Yeah, I heard of that.

What Comes Next, and Why Research Is the Best Part

Diana: We got a a huge offer from Saint Martin’s Press. He turned them down and he went. He self published, and he did a lot better than he would have done with Saint Martin’s press. But, I would have to say, that’s kind of a it’s like hitting the lottery, you know, being that successful.

Well, my next, my next book that’s coming out is it’s another biographical novel. It’s about Edith Roosevelt who was Theodore Roosevelt’s wife. and I don’t have a publication date for that yet, but that’s the next one that that my publisher has it in the queue. I’m not sure exactly where it is in the queue, but that’s the next one that’s going to be coming out.

They were very interesting people to research, too, Teddy and Edith Roosevelt. So I really enjoyed researching and writing that.

Richard: Interesting. Yeah, I like, I like reading books about the Roman Empire and fiction novels about that. Probably write one eventually. But, as you said. It’s too much research for me right now.

Diana: It is. Yeah. Well, to me the research is the best part, because I’m a history nut, and I love delving as deep as I can into into archives and meeting some of these. If I can meet an expert in whatever person or or era I can get that that’s always meet, enjoy meeting people like that.

But yeah, I think the research is the best part. But yeah. that would be great if you indulge your dream, and write your book about your Roman Empire. Sure.

Quotable moments

Frequently asked questions

Who is Diana Rubino?

Diana Rubino is a historical novelist who writes fiction about real figures, often with a paranormal twist. She has published roughly eighteen books through small independent publishers and has been a member of the Richard III Society for over thirty years.

What does Diana Rubino write about?

Historical and biographical novels centered on real figures, including Richard III, Henry VIII’s court, Alexander Hamilton, and Aaron Burr and Eliza Jumel. Her next book is about Edith Roosevelt.

How did Diana Rubino start writing about Richard III?

She found a book about him shelved in the wrong place at the Cambridge Public Library while looking for her next subject, checked it out, and became fascinated. She has been a Richard III Society member for over thirty years.

Who publishes Diana Rubino’s books?

Small independent publishers. After early rejections from major romance houses, she worked with a British publisher and now writes for Wild Rose Press and Next Chapter Publishing.