DOGMATIC: She ain't so bad; she just plays that way. Linda Fiorentino has been typecast as the bad girl of film ever since she nastily seduced men in The Last Seduction.

Now, she's trying to make up for it in the newly released Dogma, by Clerks man Kevin Smith.

"I figured that I played such a bad girl in that film," says the throaty brunette, "that I had a lot of making up to do. I had to do penance."

It is the very Catholic Smith who's pegged as the bad guy. Some churchgoers say his film about God and angels is anti-religious.

"I'm just as much a practising Catholic as anybody," says Smith. "I even checked with my priest before I started shooting."

ROMANCING THE STOVE: Talking to romance-queen Nora Roberts is an appetizing experience. Not only does she speak of love and raven-haired, broad-shouldered heroes, but she does it while she's cooking.

"I'm making french fries for dinner," says Roberts, who has every right to celebrate with fried goodies. Last month, she had four books on the New York Times bestseller list.

"It's a tremendous thrill," she says, of her works -- The Reef, The Donovan Legacy, Enchanted and Loyalty In Death -- the latter being her first to hit the list under her guy-name pseudonym, J.D. Robb.

She's had 40 novels on the NYT bestseller list -- 13 this year -- and has written 133 novels all together. Writer's block is not in her vocabulary. "I'm just very disciplined," she says. "I write six to eight hours a day and I really love my work. That's the key."

The test of her words, she says, is when they make her own heart palpitate.

"If I'm not emotionally involved when I'm writing, how can I expect my readers to be?"


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