March 2013
Photo © Peter Podgursky.
A native of Bergenfield, New Jersey, Donna attended Saddle River Day School and graduated from Yale with a degree in Classics and Art History and then moved to Boston. For many years she managed architecture and interpretation at the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, and wrote and directed the Witch City’s most popular Halloween theater festival, Eerie Events. She earned an MFA in film production from the USC School of Cinematic Arts, where she produced several award winning films. Donna has been a sorority housemother, a Disney/ABC Television Writing Fellow, a WGA Writer’s Access Project Honoree, and a staff writer on the ABC primetime drama, Cupid. Her screenwriting credits include episodes of the animated series, Tron: Uprising. Her short fiction has appeared in Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine and Albedo One. The director of several award-winning short films, her most recent project, The Night Caller, aired on WNET Channel 13 and was featured on Ain’t It Cool News. She is married with one cat and divides her time between Los Angeles and Salem. Currently she is a writer on the WGN drama SALEM.
She is a BCCLS native with very fond words about our libraries:
“The Bergen County Libraries were hugely important to me growing up--I would never have gone to Yale or USC or become an author without them. My mom and I used to go to Bergenfield, Teaneck, Paramus and Tenafly all the time and at 80, she still goes to Bergenfield once a week. They're an amazing resource.”
What are you reading? What’s on your nightstand?
The Other Daughter, by Lauren Willig.
Where do you go to get inspired?
I live on Boston’s North Shore in the Mcintire District in Salem, and I write fiction set in 18th century America, so I can get inspired by walking around the block, but what I love to do is go for long ambles through town, down to Derby Wharf or out to the Willows. On weekends I explore further flung historic houses in the area.
What’s something that surprised you recently (in a good way)?
George MacDonald Fraser, who wrote the brilliant Flashman novels, has a new book out. This is surprising because he is dead. The book is called Captain in Calico, and unlike his later, satirical work, it’s a straightforward swashbuckler in the vein of Sabatini. His children found the manuscript—his first, unsold novel, and decided to publish it. The book doesn’t have the brilliance of Flashman or Fraser’s amazing WWII Burma Campaign memoir, Quartered Safe Out Here, but it’s a love letter to books like Captain Blood and Black Bartelmy’s Treasure and window on the writer’s development as a storyteller.
Where do you write?
My writing room is on the second floor of our 18th century house and it overlooks the Broad Street Cemetery in Salem.
What/who makes you laugh? Why?
My cats. They’re siblings and best friends and occasionally mortal enemies. You can say that about some of my characters too…
Favorite fictional character ever?
Francis Crawford of Lymond from Dorothy Dunnett’s Lymond Chronicles.
What are you working on?
I just finished writing a book called THE DUTCH GIRL for Penguin NAL which is set on a patroon estate in the Hudson River Valley during the American Revolution and I’m about to start writing for the 3rd season of the cable drama SALEM on WGN.
"…Thorland’s first novel is a surprising and engrossing tale. Immersing the reader in 1777 Philadelphia, sweeping from decadent high-society balls to the filth of battlefield infirmaries. Thorland exhibits real passion for the time period. Fans of Philippa Gregory and Loretta Chase will find THE TURNCOAT a thrilling read."
—Booklist
The Turncoat by
They are lovers on opposite sides of a brutal war, with everything at stake and no possibility of retreat. They can trust no one--especially not each other. Major Lord Peter Tremayne is the last man rebel bluestocking Kate Grey should fall in love with, but when the handsome British viscount commandeers her home, Kate throws caution to the wind and responds to his seduction. She is on the verge of surrender when a spy in her own household seizes the opportunity to steal the military dispatches Tremayne carries, ensuring his disgrace--and implicating Kate in high treason. Painfully awakened to the risks of war, Kate determines to put duty ahead of desire, and offers General Washington her services as an undercover agent in the City of Brotherly Love. Months later, having narrowly escaped court martial and hanging, Tremayne returns to decadent, British-occupied Philadelphia with no stomach for his current assignment--to capture the woman he believes betrayed him. Nor does he relish the glittering entertainments being held for General Howe's idle officers. Worse, the glamorous woman in the midst of this social whirl, the fiancée of his own dissolute cousin, is none other than Kate Grey herself. And so begins their dangerous dance, between passion and patriotism, between certain death and the promise of a brave new future together. READERS GUIDE INCLUDED
The Rebel Pirate by
“Let Donna Thorland sweep you back to the American Revolution, into a world of spies, suspense, skullduggery, and sex.” —William Martin, New York Times Bestselling Author of Back Bay 1775, Boston Harbor. James Sparhawk, Master and Commander in the British Navy, knows trouble when he sees it. The ship he’s boarded is carrying ammunition and gold…into a country on the knife’s edge of war. Sparhawk’s duty is clear: confiscate the cargo, impound the vessel and seize the crew. But when one of the ship’s boys turns out to be a lovely girl, with a loaded pistol and dead-shot aim, Sparhawk finds himself held hostage aboard a Rebel privateer. Sarah Ward never set out to break the law. Before Boston became a powder keg, she was poised to escape the stigma of being a notorious pirate’s daughter by wedding Micah Wild, one of Salem’s most successful merchants. Then a Patriot mob destroyed her fortune and Wild played her false by marrying her best friend and smuggling a chest of Rebel gold aboard her family’s ship. Now branded a pirate herself, Sarah will do what she must to secure her family’s safety and her own future. Even if that means taking part in the cat and mouse game unfolding in Boston Harbor, the desperate naval fight between British and Rebel forces for the materiel of war—and pitting herself against James Sparhawk, the one man she cannot resist. READERS GUIDE INCLUDED
Mistress Firebrand by
British Occupied Manhattan, 1777. With her witty comedies, American actress Jennifer Leighton has been packing the John Street Theater, but she longs to escape the provincial circuit for the glamour of the London stage. When the playwright General John Burgoyne visits the city, fresh from a recent success in the capitol, she seizes the opportunity to court his patronage. But her plan is foiled by British intelligence officer Severin Devere. Severin’s mission is to keep the pleasure-loving general focused on the war effort…and away from pretty young actresses. But the tables are turned when Severin himself can’t resist Jennifer Leighton… Months later, Jenny has abandoned her dreams of stage glory and begun writing seditious plays for the Rebels under the pen name “Cornelia,” ridiculing “Gentleman Johnny” Burgoyne and his army—and undermining the crown’s campaign to take Albany. By the time Severin meets up with Jenny once again, she is on a British hanging list, and Severin is ordered to find her—and deliver her to certain death. Soon, the two are launched on a desperate journey through the wilderness, toward a future shaped by the revolution—and their passion for each other… READERS GUIDE INCLUDED
