Donna Hill published her first novel in 1990. Since then she's gone on to have fifty published titles to her credit. Yes that's fifty. 5-0. And she keeps writing. If only I had her discipline!

Her new book, ON THE LINE, flips the traditional novel completely on its head. 18 talented writers from Francis Ray and Bernice McFadden to Robert Fleming and Tracy Price-Thompson, come together to tell the story of radio talk-show host Joy Newhouse. More than Words was so intrigued with the book's concept that we had to talk to Donna Hill about coordinating such an ambitious project, how this fits into her long literary career, and the world of black books.

MTW: You are the author of more than fifty books. How do you find time to do anything else but write?

Donna Hill: This question always makes me smile. I wish there was an easy answer but there isn't. I suppose the thing to keep in perspective is that I have been published in novel form since 1990. Some years I just happen to be more "energetic" than others. Not to mention that contractual deadlines will keep you hopping as well. Over the years I've written for multiple houses simultaneously, which often accounted for the number of books I wrote. And I suppose the bottom line is that my head is always full of ideas... different kinds of stories on a variety of topics and I've been fortunate enough to work with editors and houses that allowed me to write what I wanted to write. But don't get me wrong, I still have a life! A busy one at that. Up until two years ago I worked a full time job as a publicist for the Queens Library system, managed my three kids (most of the time they managed me) and still found time for a relationship. So it wasn't all work. I make time for play.MTW: Your new novel ON THE LINE is a collaborative project featuring great writers like Bernice McFadden, Robert Fleming, L.A. Banks, Parry "Ebony Satin" Brown and a list of others. Tell us more about the project, especially how you established and eventually executed the idea.

DH: Wow, this one was a major challenge. When I presented the idea to Glenda Howard the Executive Editor for Sepia, I knew that I wanted to do "something different" in terms of an anthology. I've packaged other collections which, for the most part, followed the traditional format. For ON THE LINE I wanted to bring in the voices of writers that I admired, that I knew I could work with and could work with me and were most of all willing to go along with my crazy idea, which was to "novelize the anthology." By that I mean that the stories would be woven into the life and times of Joy Newhouse, the radio shock jock who in her mind takes reality radio to the next level. When I reached out to the authors I gave them the basics: who Joy was, what station she worked for and that their contributions would actually be Joy's phone calls, letters and emails that came into the station. I made it clear to the authors that they could not simply write a "Dear Joy" my husband is cheating on me letter. They had to give all the details, the "he said and she said". And trust me they did! None of the authors knew what the others were writing so it was amazing that the stories were so diverse: from fall out funny, to totally erotic, to serious and everything in between. We even had some supernatural stuff going on.

So when the stories all came in, it was my job to figure out where I would put them and then I had to wrap Joy's story around them, giving the reader her responses and reaction and all the while you find out more and more about her along the way. The result is a novel about Joy and the crazy letters and calls that she receives and how it all changes her life. It has a kick-ass ending that shocked everyone who read it. What's most interesting about the book is that although there are contributions from 18 authors, the stories are not separated as in a typical anthology; they read like a novel.

I'd tried this concept once before with INDECENT EXPOSURE. With that one it was three authors, Victor McGlothin, Tracy Price Thompson and Carmen Green, which was much easier to manage. In that one as well, all three voices were woven together into one.

MTW: Your first novel was published in 1990, how has the African American literary landscape changed since then?

DH: Wow! How hasn't it changed? Back then there were less than a few African American fiction writers. When I started out in the romance genre at that time perhaps less than a dozen romances written by and about African Americans had ever been published. My book, ROOMS OF THE HEART, was published by a small black publishing company in Silver Spring, Maryland--Odyssey Books. When the book was released no one could have been more excited than me, only to find out that the publisher had no distribution. No one was willing to take a chance on black romance novels--black fiction period. So I started getting the names and addresses of local black bookstores in New York and walking in with my book. I encouraged them to take them on consignment, take some for free, you name it. The questions I always got was "what was it?" and "where did it belong?" There were no other black romances out there at the time. Finally I visited Medgar Evers College bookstore and met a woman who asked me why was I running around trying to get my books in stores when there was a black book distributor. She gave me the woman's name to contact--Robbie. Once I contacted them they made a deal with Odyssey Books and we finally got distribution. Since then, of course, all of the major houses slowly started publishing more and more books by African Americans after black romance took off, with Kensington Publishing leading the way. Then we started seeing "black imprints" within the major houses and authors were able to publish in all of the genres. It took time, but here we are.

MTW: What's next for you?

DH: I'm currently working on a new series, THE LADIES CARTEL. The first book, SEX AND LIES, will be released in February. Not sure when I will package another collection but already readers are asking will there be a sequel to ON THE LINE. Perhaps. I have a murder mystery that I'm finishing up for St. Martins Press called MURDER IN THE AISLES. And in between I'm busy with doing publicity for a few people and sticking my toes into publishing.