Author Spotlight: LaQuette
Author LaQuette took the time out of her busy schedule to answer all my burning author questions. Keep scrolling to see what she says about her author journey and Janae Sanders’ Second Time Around.
Meet LaQuette
LaQuette, author of Vanessa Jared’s Got A Man and Royal Bride Demand, writes sexy, stylish, and sensational romance. That means sentimental and steamy stories (Hallmark-like tales, but HAWT) with big emotions featuring fashionable and bold characters. If this Brooklyn native and current Ph.D. student isn’t writing, reading, or studying, she’s probably trying on or looking for her next great makeup find.
Let’s get to know LaQuette
Leah: What initially drew you to the romance genre as a writer?
LaQuette: The idea of love conquering all deeply appeals to me. Romance is a genre of hope, and we need more love in the world.
Leah: Do you read romance? And if yes, do you have a gateway romance book?
LaQuette: Yes, I do! I read 150 romances in 2025. Anything by Naima Simone, Siera London, Kenya Goree Bell, Celestine Martin, Jessica Cage, Eden Finely, Saxon James, and Anabeth Albert is a great way to enter the genre.
Leah: How do you keep your stories fresh?
LaQuette: I can’t really answer that except to say I write stories centering Black joy and community. Writing from that premise always gives me something new to tap into.
Leah: Can you share any writing rituals or habits that help you stay focused and productive during the writing process?
LaQuette: Listening to music as I write is the only ritual I have. I don’t listen to music to focus; I listen to it to help me emote. If I need a certain scene to have a specific emotional vibe, I listen to a song that helps me feel that way while I’m listening to it.
Leah: What challenges do you face when writing romance, and how do you overcome them?
LaQuette: Writing is instinctive to me, and I don’t usually have a problem sitting down and writing as long as I have an outline or synopsis in front of me. Having a road map keeps me on a linear path from start to finish. Without a synopsis, I often feel as if I’m wandering with no clear path.
Leah: How do you handle romantic tropes and clichés to keep your stories fresh and engaging for readers?
LaQuette: I love tropes. They let the reader know what the setup is before they even open the book. For me, I don’tnecessarily think about how to make the trope new. Instead, I think more about the love interests and figure out what’s so special about them. For instance, I write forced proximity all the time. However, it shows up differently depending on the story I’m telling for a particular romantic pairing. A royal forced proximity has different stakes and settings than a business tycoon’s forced proximity. Things like setting, age, racial, ethnic, and cultural background, education, socioeconomic status, and even region will make that same trope look very different depending on who the people are being “forced” to stay in each other’s presence.
Leah: You write Cowboys/royals/contemporary… do you have a favorite out of them…. or are there appeals to all?
LaQuette: I don’t think I have a favorite. I love them all. It really boils down to what my brain is cooking up on any given moment or what kind of entertainment I’m consuming.
About Janae Sanders’ Second Time Around:
Leah: Sexy, Savvy & Single Series: What was your inspiration for this series?
LaQuette: I don’t tend to write protagonists younger than thirty-something. I write grown and sexy romance and that requires my characters to have more life experience than the typical twenty-something. Ultimately, I wanted to see older love interests get their shine. I’mknocking on fifty’s door. If romance is still alive in my life, I didn’t understand why protagonists in their thirties, forties, and beyond couldn’t have the same experience.
Leah: These women a force in their own right… how important is it to portray strong heroines?
LaQuette: Very. My heroines, even when they’re put in situations they don’t necessarily like, always have agency. They have a choice and a voice. Having agency and autonomy doesn’t mean being aggressive and hard. Being strong simply means they have a vision for their own lives. They have boundaries, and they don’t let people trample over them. They protect their peace, and they don’t seek approval from the outside. These are the women I know, the ones who raised me, the ones in my friend groups right now.
Leah: Small town… everyone knows everyone and their business… Is it hard to keep this from running away from you?
LaQuette: No. One of the purposes of small-town romance is to make the town feel like a character in the story. If I were to take a small-town romance and put it in the big city, the small town would turn into the nosy neighbor across the hall. The intimacy of a small townallows for a deep dive into emotions with a good bit of external interference that can both help and or hinder the protagonists.
Leah: Janea is the type of woman that many strive to be… she is strong, confident, but she still has that element of disquiet because of past relationships. Is it hard to create a balance between these emotions and traits in your characters?
LaQuette: There’s this misconception that strong people are built differently, that they can handle anything, and they never have any doubts. The truth is that strong people are often strong because they have no other alternative. Janae is a woman who had to fight to get out of a toxic marriage while simultaneously trying to raise her son and co-parent with the very person who was causing her so much strife. She didn’t have anyone who would swoop in and save her. She had to save herself or drown in that situation. My focus with Janae is to show why she was so strong. To depict her strength as a last alternative. Knowing that, I was able to understand why someone like her would be so guarded and what type of romantic partner she’d find worthy of taking a risk on.
Leah: James’ story was such a big part of this book… often times those types of stories fall into the background. I love the way you created this story line and the fierce way Janae goes to bat for James… why make the choice to have it front and center?
LaQuette: I’m a mom. I will fight you to the death over my kids. Janae is no different. Since so much of her focus is on James, his story had to be on page as the strongest motivation for her. As a mom, James’ story very much impacts Janae. His story makes the reader understand the motivation behind everything she does or doesn’t do.
Leah: What scene was the most challenging to get right?
LaQuette: There wasn’t any one scene I found difficult. I think overall, I had to work the hardest on the dynamic between Janae and Adam. When you write a heroine as strong and protective as Janae, you must be very careful about how you build her hero. Adam couldn’t be this over-the-top alpha male because Janae would’ve told him to kick rocks with open-toed shoes on.
He also couldn’t be a pushover who would allow Janae to do anything she wanted without pushback. He needed to be firm, but patient with her. He needed to know his own strength and be comfortable with hers. He also needed to have his own journey that allowed the reader to understand why he was so willing to be patient with Janae too.
Leah: Adam is a guy that seems to have it all…. but he is struggling even though he knows he made the right choice for himself. He is not as confident as he portrays… why make this character decision?
LaQuette: I’d argue that Adam is confident, just not in the way men are encouraged to be. Adam has a quiet confidence. He doesn’t need to bang on his chest to prove he’s a man. His leaving home for twenty years wasn’t about him running. It was about him putting a firm boundary in place where his father was concerned. Adam didn’t need to yell; he just removed himself from the toxic situation he was in and did the work to become the man he wanted to be. I intentionally wrote him this way because men are human too.
Men have long been trained by society to ignore what makes them human because those traits are seen as feminine. Adam, however, has learned the hard way that ignoring who he is and the things he wants for his life was the fastest way to lose himself. In order to find himself, he’s had to learn to make some really difficult decisions. His coming home, back to the place where he first learned to erase himself means he has to fight hard not to slip into old habits that will wipe out all the progress he’s made in the twenty years he’s been away from home. The moments of doubt are him struggling to remain the man he is and not revert to the child he was.
Leah: The friendships are strong and true…. I love that…. i don’t have a question about it… but if you could speak to the importance of having solid groups with the guys and then girls… but then the six of them as a whole.
LaQuette: In my eyes, friendship isn’t just about good times. It’s also about making sure you get through the bad times better than you were before. These groups are much more than friends. They’re found family. They act as both support and accountability for each other. They encourage and celebrate each other, making sure every person in the dual trios, and then the entire group of six, are in good places individually and collectively.
Leah: Coparenting in the positive. So many stories give us the negative side of divorce (and while we see that some here… there is also a lot of growth). Was it a conscious decision to write it this way?
LaQuette: Absolutely, it was. In the case of Janae and her ex-husband Marques, divorce was absolutely the best choice for them. Neither of them was healthy in that marriage. Continuing it would’ve caused irrevocable harm to them and their son James. Separating, doing the work they needed to do individually through therapy helped them each become better versions of themselves so they could both be there for their son.
This is especially true for the ex-husband who has a lot to account for. I didn’t want to just relegate him to villain status. I wanted him to acknowledge his wrongdoing and work to get himself together. Janae doesn’t just allow him re-entry into their lives because he’s James’ father. Marques has to do the work first to prove he’s ready to be a committed parent to their son before they can begin to develop a good co-parenting relationship. No parent is perfect. However, I wanted these two parents to care enough about their child, and themselves to seek and get the help they needed so the child could thrive.
Leah: Somewhat Toxic Parent Relationships between Adam and his dad as well as Janae and her mom…. but can start to heal them… These felt real but also show the growth of each character. What reasoning did you have with healing these relationships rather than cutting them out?
LaQuette: Not all toxic relationships can nor should be healed. In the case of Janae’s mother and Adam’s father, however, much of their toxic behavior was born out of a misguided attempt to see their children reach a level of success they themselves could not have dreamt of. And while these relationships are working toward healing by the end of the book, it takes each of their parents acknowledging how they’ve done their children wrong and them working on themselves before healing can begin to take place.
Leah: Forgiveness is a big theme. Why was showing this important to you in this story?
LaQuette: Forgiveness is not to absolve the perpetrator of their wrongs. Forgiveness is for the injured party to be able to let go and move on from the hurt, so they aren’t trapped in that cycle of hurt. Also, forgiveness doesn’t mean regaining access to the injured party. Adam removed his father’s access to him by living out of state for twenty years and rarely coming home in between that time. He does it again when his father offends Janae.
During that final time, he makes sure his father understands that he will not be part of Adam’s life until he learns to do better, acknowledges his wrongdoing, and makes amends to Janae. It was important for both Janae’s and Adam’s personal growth arcs to hold their parents accountable but also move on from the hurt Adam and Janae endured while hanging on to that anger.
Leah: Without spoilers, can you tease what’s next??
LaQuette: I’m currently working on book 3 in the Savvy, Sexy, and Single Club series. We’re going to unpack and unravel Cree and Derrick’s very complicated story. After that, I’ll be working on my mafia duet for Harlequin Presents.
Leah: Are you going to go back into your Crowning a Devereaux Series?
LaQuette: As of now, there are no plans to continue that series. But who knows, down the line, Princesses Sade and Nairobi might get their stories as the next generation of Devereauxs to fall in love.
Leah: 2 or 3 fun facts about your writing, reading or yourself.
LaQuette: I love to bake. Bread, cookies, pies, all of it. I love making baked goods from scratch. It helps me decompress and de-stress.
I have to write with music in my ears, otherwise, I get bored and everything feels forced.
I get all my good writing ideas when I’m driving or in the shower.
Check out my review of JANAE SANDERS’ SECOND TIME AROUND HERE.
Connect with LaQuette
Website: https://laquette.com/
Instagram:https://www.instagram.com/la_quette/
Goodreads:https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/7480299.LaQuette
