Now that Lionheart has been dispatched (via e-mail yet; ah, brave new world) to my editor, I am able to rejoin the world again and I am delighted to be able to share an interview with one of my favorite mystery writers, Priscilla Royal.  In the interest of full disclosure, I should say that Priscilla is a friend, but I became a fan before we met at the Poisoned Pen in Scottsdale.  I was struck by how well she seemed to understand the medieval mind; her characters are always firmly rooted in the 13th century, very much men and women of their times.  They are also sympathetic, yet very human; much of the action may revolve around an abbey, but there are no saints there!   Valley of Dry Bones is her seventh entry in the Eleanor-Thomas mysteries, and it kept me up into the early hours of the morning.  High suspense and a strong medieval ambience–who could ask for more?   But now I’ll let Priscilla speak for herself.

What attracted you to medieval history?

My fascination probably began during my childhood in Canada, but chance has encouraged it. A high school teacher gave me a paperback copy of The Canterbury Tales because I liked Chaucer. At San Francisco State University, I accidentally signed up for a class taught by John Gardner, a controversial medieval scholar but one who vividly brought to life both the times and the literature. I became quite hooked. Much damage has been done to our understanding of medieval life, especially by the Victorians who viewed the era as either terribly romantic or awfully barbaric. To my mind, the Middle Ages are complex and rich, yet subtle, without the flashing opulence of the Renaissance. In any case, the medieval era is not just the commonly assumed centuries of lock-step religion, primitive art, suppression of women, appalling ignorance, superstition, and filth. All eras possess unspeakable brutality, as well as enlightenment, a pattern that has varied little throughout history. In the 12^th century, there was creative intellectual debate while the 14^th was a cruel time for the thoughtful dissenter. But in modern times, Stalin came after the progressive Alexander II, and the McCarthy years were followed by improved civil rights in the 1960s. History teaches that enlightenment and compassion are not modern inventions and that we must never assume they will be permanent features in any society.

What author first inspired you to write medieval mysteries?

Ellis Peters, the consummate storyteller who respected research while integrating it so well the flow of the mystery was never hampered. In Brother Cadfael, she created the perfect sleuth: the outsider who could see what others, blinded by familiarity and assumptions, missed. Since her detective lived in an anarchic era, he could explore the meaning of justice in any given situation because there was no rule of law. Although no reasonable person wants vigilantism, we also recognize that laws can be unjust or badly interpreted. Defining justice is always interesting to the mystery reader because we want a fair resolution of a crime within the spirit of law. As far as Ellis Peters’ influence on my work, I only hope that I have learned enough from her to create entertaining variations.

Did you intend to write a series? If so, why?

I love series so planned a long one. One favorite author early on was Anthony Trollope, a writer who created an entire county and demonstrated that a series could remain vital as long as it was carefully paced and there were enough interesting characters for variety. As a reader, I love settling in with a world and its inhabitants, watching the evolution of both, and eagerly awaiting the next book. How will the author entertain, surprise, and inform me next? As a writer, I discovered the joy of slow character development, balancing humor and tension, as well as craft experimentation so the books do not become boring. And with historicals, I could add the fun of research and learning more about my chosen era. A series is like a marriage. To be successful, it needs work, trust, and dedication.

Tell us about your characters, how they developed, and what roles they play.

Eleanor arrived first: a small woman, determined and a bit fierce. I thought she’d make a good 21^st century CEO or head of a social justice group. Imagine my surprise when she announced she was a 13^th century English prioress. As my jaw dropped, she suggested I study the Order of Fontevraud to discover what clever young women (albeit high-born) could do in the Middle Ages. She also said that she might have a sincere vocation but she would have struggles with pride and a strong sexuality. Brother Thomas revealed himself more slowly. I did not want a Dr. Watson type. He had to be a powerful character in his own right or frankly both Eleanor and I would get bored with him. Unfortunately, he started evolving into good husband material for her. I wasn’t interested in a series with romps in the monastic hayloft, but I couldn’t imagine them as sexless characters either. They are both of an age when biology demands mating. Luckily, Thomas solved part of the problem by admitting he was gay. This gave him some rather profound issues to resolve. Although he must behave differently in the 13^th century than he would in the 21^st, I promised him that he would not fall into some easy solution that would insult his integrity. As a gay man, he is, and shall remain, a real mensch. His announcement also allowed me to investigate a lesser known, and often avoided, aspect of medieval society and to explore the complex nature of love as he and Eleanor evolve in the series. The main secondary characters arrived quickly, generously allowing themselves to reveal aspects of medieval life. Sister Anne illustrates a woman’s choices when her husband decides to take religious vows. Ralf may be rebellious, but he is still the youngest son of minor nobility and family interests demand his loyalty. Gytha, the prioress’ maid, comes from a family of pre-Conquest Saxon thegns. Now the conquered people, they struggle to achieve merchant class.

Why choose monastic sleuths rather than secular ones?

The answer partially lies in the monastic leader’s authority as well as an element of Christian belief. An abbot/abbess or prior/prioress was the representative of religious law on Church property and for their monastics. As such, they had the right to investigate and often try any of their religious who committed felonies. So a presumed amateur like Eleanor has the right to get involved in crimes. Added to this was the belief that a religious might be a flawed mortal, incapable of perfection, but he/she was still obliged to strive toward God’s perfection. If God was perfect, so was His justice. Thus Eleanor may rationalize her attempts to find a more perfect justice than that found in secular society—and sometimes the religious one. And, finally, the Church and the State were in constant war with each other over power and wealth. This adds tension and plot possibilities for my religious sleuths, liegemen of the Church, when they must deal with secular authority.

Why did you pick the late 13^th century/early 14th?

I suffer the curse of once being a comparative literature major so sought a period with historical events that might resonate with us today. The late 1200s/early 1300s were perfect. I’m not trying to force comparisons between that era and today, but I do see hints of similarities—like an image in a pond when a breeze ruffles the surface. History rarely duplicates itself, but the past often illustrates the dangers of taking certain paths and the consequences of decisions made. And I thought it would be fun to play with the issue of transitioning generations: if people grew up learning the values of one era, what would they do when faced with changing ideals, practices, prospects? Whether deemed good, bad, or indifferent, Henry III’s reign lasted fifty-six years. That was longer than the average lifespan in the 13^th century. Then his son, Edward I, arrived, a man who tried to be his father’s opposite. Relative peace exploded into many wars. Lax legal practices were reined in. Stricter laws enforced compliance. Bled dry by taxes and fees, all Jews were expelled from England. The Church rejected debate and experimentation, growing rigid and choosing violence to silence dissent. The causes of change were complex but included a global chilling which severely affected health and the economy. My characters will face interesting dilemmas as the series progresses!

Tell us about your newest book.

Valley of Dry Bones is now out in traditional print, audio, and e-reader versions. Although I try not to favor any amongst the series brood, this book was especially fun to write, in part because I could finally include liturgical dramas. In 2003, I saw The Play of Daniel, presented by Aurora Theater and the Pacific Mozart Ensemble in Berkeley CA, a work that may be 12^th-13^th century but reminded me of early opera with all the drama but fewer stage mechanics. It also had roaring lions, the perfect backdrop to murder. My excitement must have been contagious because many characters showed up for inclusion in Valley. I rejected several, bribing some with appearances in future books. Crowner Ralf’s brother, the sheriff, did make final casting, and Eleanor’s nemesis, the man in black, who is Thomas’ spymaster. Although I once assumed this latter fellow, now named Father Eliduc, was a villain, I discovered he possessed interesting shades of gray. Since Edward I is now king, I also wanted to hint at coming events. Ralf and his brother see the advent of a new legal system: less overt corruption but fewer options for individualized justice. Father Eliduc foresees the evolution in the Church/State power struggle and recognizes the need to recruit men possessed of more zeal but probably fewer scruples. The future interaction between Eleanor and Eliduc promises to be exciting.

Thank you, Sharon, for inviting me to your blog. Your books have given me much pleasure over the years and are an ongoing source of inspiration as well as a major reason the medieval era continues to intrigue. Should any of your readers have questions about my series, my website (www.priscillaroyal.com) provides a link to my email. And if they are interested in blogs, I am one of the mystery writers at the Lady Killers (www.theladykillers.typepad.com
Thank you, Priscilla!  I know you’re hard at work on another medieval mystery, so I appreciate your taking the time away from your writing and researching to pay us a visit.  
November 18, 2010

     I have recently been approached about conducting a tour of Eleanor of Aquitaine’s France in 2011.   I am working out the details of this project with Academic Travel Aboard, a professional tour operator in Washington, DC that has sixty years of experience in the educational travel field.  We plan to delve into twelfth century life during this 10-12 day tour of Paris, Poitiers, and other sites closely associated with Eleanor’s life and times.  Naturally we are considering Fontevrault Abbey and Chinon Castle.  We would like to get feedback from my readers and Facebook and my blog offer a unique opportunity to do this.  If you click onto the link below, you can participate in a very brief poll; your answers will help us to shape the program.   And of course I’d be very interested in any comments and suggestions you care to make.  There are some truly spectacular places associated with Eleanor, Henry, and their Devil’s Brood, including Mont St Michel and Carcassonne.  I’ve often mentioned the spell that Fontevrault casts and I’d love to share that experience with some of my readers.  So please do take the poll and let me know your thoughts.   Thanks!

 http://www.zoomerang.com/Survey/WEB22BD52FCKZ8  

October 23, 2010

     I am delighted to be able to interview an author I’ve long admired, Laurel Corona.  Laurel has a very interesting background; she was a professor of English and the humanities at San Diego City College and is the author of a number of Young Adult books written for school libraries.  She is also the author of Until The Last Breath: A Holocaust Story of Love and Partisan Resistance, and The Four Seasons, a novel about Antonio Vivaldi’s Venice.  And she has perfectly expressed the responsibilities of the historical novelist in what I think should be our Eleventh Commandment–Do not defame the dead.   Today is the publication date for Laurel’s new novel, Penelope’s Daughter.  This has been at the top of my TBE list as soon as I heard about it, and I plan to treat myself as soon as Lionheart goes off to my editor.  But I will let you learn about Penelope’s Daughter and its fascinating premise in Laurel’s own words.

How did you come up with the idea for PENELOPE’S DAUGHTER?

I guess you could say I gave birth to Xanthe, the main character in PENELOPE’S DAUGHTER, over the dinner table one night. (That’s a weird image isn’t it–giving birth to someone else’s child among the dinner plates and wine glasses?

My partner Jim and I had recently returned from a midwinter trip to Venice, where I was researching a few final details for THE FOUR SEASONS before it went to press.  We were reminiscing about how much fun we’d had, and Jim wondered aloud what might be an equally fun location for my second novel.

At the time I was already in the very early planning stages for what I thought I was going to write next, but out of curiosity, I asked him where he wanted to go. Jim is a great lover of the classics, so I wasn’t surprised when he said Greece, but it was news to me that, as widely traveled as he is, he had never been there.

“Okay,” I said, “we have to go. Now all I need to figure out is what the novel will be about.”  I don’t remember which one of us suggested Homer, but I will never forget Jim’s reaction when I said, “How about if, when Odysseus goes off to the Trojan War, he doesn’t know Penelope is pregnant with a daughter?”

“You can’t mess with Homer!” Jim insisted.  And of course, once he said that, I had to write PENELOPE’S DAUGHTER just to prove him wrong!

How does putting a daughter in the story change it?

The ODYSSEY has two narrative strands, Odysseus’ adventures and the “meanwhile, back at the ranch” story about the suitors trying to steal Odysseus’ wife and kingdom.  Odysseus’ adventures aren’t part of my book at all, but once I thought about the impact of a daughter on the story of the women left behind–whom, quite frankly, Homer shows very little interest in–the whole epic broke open as a far more fascinating tale than the one Homer wrote down.

Homer’s Penelope is a male fantasy, a woman stubbornly faithful to–and helpless without–her man.  Odysseus is gone nearly twenty years, but what’s that to a good wife?  There was no way I could base a novel around someone who does nothing but weep and moan about her situation and pray for her husband’s return.

What is there between the lines in Homer’s story, however, is that Penelope is a teenaged bride, a pampered princess taken from her luxurious childhood home to a rocky, poor, island kingdom. She lives with her new husband, a rough-hewn local warlord, only long enough for their first child to reach his first birthday. She is probably at most seventeen when he leaves her alone, without the support of friends or family, for twenty years.  That’s an interesting starting point for a story about a girl who must rise to the occasion and become a strong woman, mother, and queen.

The other immediately obvious thing was that the suitors would have no interest in Penelope if she had a daughter. That daughter, not Penelope, would be Odysseus’ heir if Telemachus, her older brother, were to die–which, Homer tells us, the suitors have in mind. My story revolves around the fact that in this violent and predatory environment, the victorious suitor would be the one who impregnated Xanthe, forced a marriage, and produced an heir. Penelope, therefore, must figure out how to keep her son from being murdered and her daughter from being raped.  All this becomes part of the plot of my novel.

The third revelation was Helen.  We know from other sources that Helen was married at twelve and had an eight-year-old daughter when she went off to Troy.  That means she had to be at least twenty-one at the time the Trojan War started and thirty-one when it was finally over.  Helen and Penelope are cousins fairly close in age, so when Penelope sends thirteen-year-old Xanthe to Sparta to keep her safe in Helen’s care, the Helen whom Xanthe lives with is middle aged by the standards of the time. Being ravishingly beautiful is enough to make her important in Homer’s story, but an older woman had better be interesting in her own right.  I wondered what someone like Helen would be like at that age, after all she has seen and done, and it was really a joy to give her substance in my story.

What have you learned about yourself from writing fiction? How is your own personality reflected in your novels?

I have to agree about the autobiographical underpinnings of all fiction, but I think this means something different from what many people think. It doesn’t necessarily mean that our characters are aspects of ourselves, or that our plots connect to events in our lives. What is autobiographical is that the outlook on life that is the product of an author’s genes, environment, and experiences is going to show up in the way he or she chooses a subject for a novel and then goes about formulating the plot, characters, and settings. 

I am blessed with what some people call the “happy gene.”  Even at the lowest points of my life I have been optimistic, and I tend to see others in a positive light. I am most comfortable telling stories about healthy, functional people who manage to thrive where they are, and have the courage to act to change what they can.  Tension and conflict in my novels are far more a result of historical events, and the societal limitations put on women (and men too, but women are my focus) than they are brought on by nasty or villainous characters–although I have a few of those too.

The message I have for readers is the same one I have for myself every day, that life is manageable regardless of our circumstances, that people have the strength and character to rise to whatever the situation demands, and that tomorrow is always worth sticking around for. My novels have helped me to clarify and affirm those beliefs for myself and I hope readers hear those themes loud and clear in all my books.

What can readers expect next from Laurel Corona?

Novel number three, FINDING EMILIE will be released by Simon and Schuster/Gallery Books in May 2011.  This, by the way, was the idea I was mulling over when that dinner table “birth” changed my plans.  It is based on the story of real-life mathematician and physicist, Emilie du Châtelet, a Parisian noblewoman who lived during the Enlightenment.  Most who know of her recall that she was Voltaire’s lover for many years, but she should be far better known for her scientific work, which include a translation and commentary on Newton’s Principia.  She was a free-spirited and flamboyant character, whose life was cut short at age 43 by complications of childbirth after an unexpected pregnancy from her affair with a dashing young soldier/poet. 

The story follows the daughter she gave birth to six days before her death. Through vignettes about Emilie, readers learn more about the mother than the daughter herself knows, and the story revolves around the daughter’s quest to figure out who she is and what she wants, and to shape her own destiny by discovering the facts about the remarkable woman whom, unknown to her, she so resembles.

There’s a lot more about FINDING EMILIE and PENELOPE’S DAUGHTER on my website, www.laurelcorona.com, as well as a peek at my work in progress, THE SHAPE OF THE WORLD.  Also, as a way of delivering on my dedication of PENELOPE’S DAUGHTER to “all the children left behind when fathers and mothers go off to war,” I maintain a blog, “Xanthe’s World,” on issues affecting military children at www.pensdaughter.blogspot.com.

Thank you, Laurel, for stopping by.  If I was eager to read Penelope’s Daughter before, now I am downright impatient!

I am delighted to welcome Jeri Westerson, the author of the popular Crispin Guest mysteries.  Jeri’s newest, The Demon’s Parchment, will soon be published, and so I invited her to stop by and talk about it. 
Sharon: While other authors writing medieval mysteries have opted for a gentle tone, frequently with a monk or nun protagonist, you have chosen to write “Medieval Noir,” with a former knight as the detective, a sub-genre you seem to have invented. How did you come up with this approach?
Jeri: I certainly enjoyed those medieval mysteries, particularly the mother of them all, Brother Cadfael (Brother of them all?) but when I sat down to write my medieval mystery, I didn’t want to write a monk or nun protagonist. I knew I wanted something more action-packed, more angsty. And I wanted a true detective, not someone who just stumbles on corpses or is asked as a favor to find out whodunit. I took my cue from the hardboiled detective fiction of Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammett that I so loved and admired. After a lot of ruminating on it, I believed I could place a hardboiled detective with all the tropes—a femme fatale, disgruntled cops, tough-talking crooks—and place him in the Middle Ages while still keeping it true to the medieval time period. It’s fun, actually, making it work, and so I came up with my disgraced knight turned detective, Crispin Guest. The stories are darker and edgier than the average medieval mystery, with a twisting tale of dark secrets, dealing with a small circle of people that blossoms into a bigger, more complex plot. It’s actually more hardboiled than in the strictest sense of noir, but “Medieval Noir” sounded better than “Medieval Hardboiled.”    
Sharon: When did you first meet your main character, Crispin Guest? Did he come to you all at once, or gradually?
Jeri: I wanted someone with fighting skills, experience on the battlefield, a facility with languages, and able to read and write. And then, following the trope of the hardboiled detective where he is somewhat down on his luck with chip on his shoulder, I knew he had to be someone who had it all and lost it. What better protagonist could there be but a disgraced knight? And once I decided on that, it all fell into place. So, a little like Athena, he sprang forth out of my forehead fully formed. I knew exactly who he was.
Sharon: Tell us about Crispin.
Jeri: Crispin is a dark and brooding man. He was the protégé of John of Gaunt, the duke of Lancaster, and lived in his household for a good part of his youth. The man was like a father to him. And so when Edward of Woodstock (the Black Prince) died, followed shortly by Edward III, the line of succession led to the Black Prince’s ten-year-old son Richard. But Crispin thought that his mentor the duke should take the throne and he joined with conspirators to make it happen. Unfortunately, all were discovered and executed. Except for Crispin. The duke begged for his life and Crispin ended up on the streets of London, devoid of his fortune, title, and status. He reinvents himself as the Tracker, finding lost objects, solving the occasional murder, all for sixpence a day plus expenses. Losing who he was naturally makes him a bit grouchy and offers some interesting angsty moments. Writing a male character is fascinating and fun. I get to be a handsome, swashbuckling, honorable-to-a-fault man for three hundred pages. That’s a far cry from the middle-aged, overweight Jewish mother I am.
Sharon: Whom do you picture as your ideal reader when you’re in the process of writing?
Jeri: Good question. I think the ideal reader would be someone who appreciates history with their mystery or vice versa. They’d also enjoy a good adventure because that’s how I think of these novels. I was terribly influenced by swashbuckling movies growing up and so I like a bit of that kind of action in my plots. Crispin is a bit Sam Spade, a bit Philip Marlowe and a bit Errol Flynn, rather a fun combination.
Sharon: You have quite a publishing story. Will you share?
Jeri: I started out in 1993 to pursue a writing career after having had a successful career as a graphic artist in Los Angeles. I wrote historical fiction that my agent just couldn’t place with publishers. It was later suggested to me that I switch to writing historical mysteries and once I got too tired of all the rejections I finally made the change. It turned around for me rather quickly. Now I have a hard time imagining writing anything else. In the interest of full disclosure, there was actually a Crispin book prior to my first published book, VEIL OF LIES, that got rejected all over town, including my publisher St. Martin’s. So my agent and I decided to put that one to bed and start working on selling Crispin number two, VEIL OF LIES which was already written. Just as I sent in that manuscript to my agent, an editor from St. Martin’s, who had rejected that first manuscript, called my agent and asked if I had anything else in that series as he “couldn’t get the characters out of his head.” Without even getting a chance to read it, my agent sent it off to St. Martin’s and two weeks later I had my first contract. And it only took fourteen years and two weeks. I am the poster child for persistence.
Sharon: How long ago did your interest in things medieval blossom?
Jeri: I was raised by parents who were rabid Anglophiles. So I grew up surrounded by English history and the love for it. We also had great historical fiction by all the big names: Thomas B. Costain, Anya Seton, Nora Lofts. I think what I liked about those books was that an historical setting offered just that bit of fantasy, taking the reader to a different place and time. The medieval period seems particularly romantic, in a sense. Arthurian legends, Robin Hood, the pageantry of a bygone era. It’s fun to fit your characters into that particular place, making them someone readers can relate to while grounding them in this foreign setting. And though it does offer a different sensibility of another time, it also affords the author the opportunity to comment on contemporary issues by couching it in the safe harbor of another era. The trick is to make sure it’s also historically accurate. 
Sharon: You’ve described your books as “romantic with a twisty mystery thrown in for good measure.” Are you talking about the concept of romance as it was originally perceived?
Jeri: That’s exactly right. As you know, Sharon, the original “romance” was an adventure tale of some hero of chivalry, and that goes back to what I said before about thinking of these novels as “adventure tales.” It’s a quest for the character to fully realize their potential as a man and as that elusive creature, the hero. I’m also fascinated by this notion of the “band of brothers” that Shakespeare coined in Henry V in, ironically enough, his St. Crispin’s Day speech. I get to explore that aspect of masculinity that is unique to men, the mystique of cleaving together in these intense relationships.
Sharon: Putting heroes aside, do you have a favorite minor character?
Jeri: That would have to be Jack Tucker, who really is also a hero. He was only supposed to be a very minor character at first but then he would not go away! He’s Crispin’s apprentice. Crispin reluctantly takes him in. He’s a street urchin, a cut purse. Orphaned at eight, he’s lived on the streets of London all that time and still managed to keep his gentle heart. Crispin comes upon him when he’s eleven. He’s a combination of Huck Finn, the Artful Dodger, and Peter Pan rolled into one. For Crispin, he’s the son and squire he’ll never now have. There’s an interesting dynamic between them and they manage to teach each other important life lessons while racing through a ripping good yarn.
Sharon: There are relics involved in your stories.
Jeri: Yes. Each novel deals with some sort of relic or legend. I like to think of the relics as the McGuffin. Alfred Hitchcock coined that term and it means the unimportant thing that sets the plot in motion, whether it’s something everyone tries to get their hands on or something everyone is trying to get rid of. It’s the sort of Maltese Falcon in these stories. It’s an added twist that I wanted to include to complicate things. But it’s not by rote. Sometimes the relic is the most important thing in the story but sometimes it’s just a McGuffin.
Sharon: Was there one book that shaped you as a child?
Jeri: Several, probably. One I remember was the Big Golden Book of Fairy Tales with myths and legends from all over the world and all different eras. Some were really quite creepy and they had wonderful illustrations to go with them. I also still have the child’s version of The Canterbury Tales, also full of bazaar illustrations. I really like the fantasy aspect of these books, so it was little wonder that the Lord of the Rings saga enveloped me when I was in high school. The idea of that marvelous world building intrigued me as well as the whole heroes journey, the chivalry, the quest, and the suffering hero. That sensibility is definitely reflected in Crispin’s tales.
Sharon: Tell us about your newest, THE DEMON’S PARCHMENT.
Jeri: Crispin is hired by a Jewish physician from France to find some stolen parchments, parchments that may have to do with the gruesome serial murders of young boys. Is a heartless killer stalking the streets and alleys of London, or something far more sinister? This is the third book in the series and it’s scheduled for release October 12. 
Sharon: What’s next for you?
Jeri: Next fall will see the release of Crispin number four, TROUBLED BONES, where Crispin and Jack are called to Canterbury to protect the bones of St. Thomas Beckett from the clutches of the Lollards, but they find murder instead and an old friend of Crispin’s who might be a killer. 
I’m also working on a second medieval mystery series with all new characters that will be lighter in tone set to be a lusty, funny, fast-paced romp. But in the meantime, you can see the Crispin series book trailer, book discussion guides, my appearance schedule to see if I’ll be in your home town, and other fun stuff on my website www.JeriWesterson.com; you can see my blog of history and mystery at www.Getting-Medieval.com; and you can read Crispin’s blog at www.CrispinGuest.com. You can also friend Crispin on his Facebook page or follow me on Twitter.
Sharon: Thank you for joining us, Jeri.  
Jeri: Thanks so much for having me, Sharon
     This was a wonderful interview and I am so sorry that I was unable to add the very striking image of The Demon’s Parchment book cover, but the evil Melusine, my computer, has gone over totally to the dark side and will no longer allow me to add photos to the blog.   So please click onto Jeri’s links above to see what the book looks like.  If you haven’t stopped by her website until now, you’re in for a treat. 
September 26, 2010

So many people have asked me how Shadow is doing that I’ve decided to respond in a blog.   I’ve had him for four months now and I am happy to report that his health problems seem to have been resolved; the vet initially suspected food allergies and then Irritable Bowel Syndrome, and he has responded well to treatment for the latter condition.  Cody had a delicate digestive system, too, despite looking as delicate as a tank.  I’ve been told that shepherds are prone to these problems, another sad case of over-breeding.  Humans have a lot to answer for in our treatment of our fellow planet dwellers, and the way we’ve undermined the health of purebred dogs is surely one of our sins.  Any one who has ever seen the slanting spine of a shepherd in a dog show can easily see why this breed is so susceptible to hip dysplasia.   Bull dogs, pugs, and all the “squashed snout” breeds are vulnerable to heat prostration; dachshunds have spinal disc problems; spaniels are more likely to develop cataracts; Dalmatians are at risk for congenital deafness.  It is a sad list, one that goes on and on.  And dogs are not the only victims.  Look what we’ve done to thoroughbred horses, breeding them for speed at the expense of stamina.    I think cats have been luckier than dogs in this respect—at least so far. 

        Sorry for the digression.  But one of the fun things about blogs is that we get to wander off the paved road into the fields from time to time.   Back to Shadow.   This is a dog who had no reason to trust human beings; he now comes eagerly up to strangers for petting and praise.   He was clearly an outside dog, for he was not housebroken, but it took him no time at all to realize furniture was much more comfortable than the floor.  He has two dog beds, but likes to sleep on the bed in my spare bedroom when I’m working at the computer; that enables him to keep an eye on me in case I get up to go toward the kitchen.  He was initially afraid of leashes, but now zooms to the door as soon as I mention the word “walk.”   Best of all, this dog who used to cringe if any one raised a hand near his head now loves to plant his head in my lap so I can rub his ears, and if I accidentally step on one of his big paws (easy to do since he is the ultimate Velcro Dog), he gives a little yelp, but shows no fear whatsoever, sure that the hurt was unintentional.  And now that he has put on some weight, he looks like a sleek white wolf—assuming that wolves like to take stuffed squeaky toys to bed with them at night.

       The Shadow-Bambi allusion comes from his first encounter with deer in our county park, 1700 acres of wooded trails.  He stopped in his tracks to stare at them, eyes wide.      But because shepherds are not bred to be hunters, he reacted with curiosity, not blood lust.  Whereas my Norwegian elkhound (the model for Loth in Saints) would go totally bonkers whenever we’d run into deer, for she knew in her bones that these creatures were meant to be her quarry.  

       I feel blessed to have found Shadow and what is so nice is that it is reciprocal.  It is true about rescue dogs—they really do seem to understand that they’ve gotten a second chance and are very grateful for it.  Dogs are remarkably forgiving.  I am reading a very compelling true account now about a Royal Marine who found himself trying to rescue fighting dogs and strays during his tour of duty in Afghanistan.  The Title is ONE DOG AT A TIME by Pen Farthing.  Be warned, though, that it is not for the faint of heart; his graphic descriptions of the sad plight of these dogs do not make easy reading.  For that matter, I found it disturbing to read about the stressful living conditions of his troop of young marines; nor is there much hope for the Afghan people, still being terrorized by the Taliban.  But it is a powerful story, one which shows human nature at its best and its worst and once again reveals the unique bond between people and dogs.  No one had ever shown these Afghan dogs even a scrap of kindness, yet they were willing to trust Pen despite a lifetime of experiences telling them that man was not their friend.   

           I had an experience of my own last week in which I saw the best and the worst of human nature, all in the course of a single day.  I’d taken my dogs for a morning walk in that county park I’d mentioned.  It has a two mile paved road in addition to all those wooded trails, and we were walking along the road when I caught movement from the corner of my eye.  A small cat popped out of the bushes and at sight of me, began to mew piteously.  To my amazement, she then started to approach us—a total stranger with two dogs!   She was obviously some one’s pet, not a feral cat, but there is not a house around for miles, so it was hard not to conclude the poor little thing had been dumped there.   She would come only so close because of my dogs, but she kept crying, as if begging for help.  I did not know what to do.  Since she wouldn’t come any closer and I had a doctor’s appointment that morning, I continued on, telling myself that she was in a heavily traveled part of the park and surely someone would come to her aid.   But she preyed on my mind for the rest of the day and that evening, I found myself piling the dogs in the car and driving to the park.

      I am not sure what I intended to do; I just felt that I had to come back.   There was no sign of her, though, so we continued on our walk.  But on our way back, there she was again, only this time she was with a middle-aged woman and a young couple.   I stopped, of course; they agreed with me that she had to have been abandoned and they were as troubled as I was about her fate.   My dogs were getting too interested in her so we went on.  I couldn’t just drive off, though, so once we got to the car, I drove back—and found them walking along the road, the little cat cradled in the older woman’s arms.   They told me that they could not leave her out in the woods and the young couple was going to adopt her.   See what I mean—the best and the worst.    What was amazing to me was that the cat was so utterly relaxed in the arms of a stranger, as if she knew she was safe now.   The saddest aspect of this is that she was probably hanging around the spot where she’d been dumped, waiting for her owners to come back for her.   Cats, too, can be forgiving, far more forgiving than I am.

         This is a first for me, no mention of medieval matters.  But the people of the MA did not view animals as so many of us do in the 21^st century.  Yes, they loved their horses, their hunting dogs, their lap dogs, their falcons and tame birds; cats seem to have infiltrated the nunneries, although in general, they were not viewed as pets.  But medievals saw animals through a religious prism—the belief that man was given dominion over the earth and all upon it.  They’d have laughed at the very idea of animal rights, as I elaborated upon in an earlier blog, SHADOW, KEIKO, AND FAUVEL.   Another reason for the difference in attitude is rooted in living conditions then and now.  We have the luxury of considering pets to be family members because life is so much easier for us than it was for people in the MA–or is for those living in Third World countries.    

       Not everyone cherishes pets as so many of us do, of course; some people seem both mystified and vexed by our concern for non-human life forms.  But I think my readers share my belief that all animals deserve to be treated without cruelty.  So this blog is for those of you who have pets as loved as Cody and Shadow, and I hope you’ll share some of their stories with the rest of us.

PS  I’d hoped to upload a photo of Shadow, but my computer, Melusine, seems bound and determined today to live up to her evil namesake, the Demon Countess of Anjou, and refused to do it, giving me lots of computer doubletalk. 

September 7, 2010    

         I’m sorry it has taken me so long to do a new blog.  My usual version of “The dog ate my homework” excuse was “Henry and Eleanor are running roughshod over their lowly scribe again” or with LIONHEART, “Richard is being a typical bloody-minded Angevin.”  But this time I can’t blame Coeur de Lion; he has actually been cooperating lately since we’re drawing near to one of his most celebrated exploits—the rescue of Jaffa.  The delay was caused by my chronic back problems, which flared up while my chiropractor was out of town; the next time he goes on vacation, I am stowing away in the trunk of his car.   But he has returned and I no longer have to severely limit my time at the computer.  So before I plunge into Chapter 34, I am going to do a blog about a subject dear to all our hearts—books.

        I have a new batch of books to recommend, which makes the “bankruptcy” reference self-explanatory.   Many of you have probably seen that bumper sticker, “So many books, so little time.”   Well, a variation of that ought to be “So many books, so little money,” for a number of temptations are coming our way.   Let’s start with the good news from Sourcebooks, which is reprinting some novels beloved by readers of historical fiction. 

1)   LEGACY, by Susan Kay, out now; this is, IMHO, the best novel written about Elizabeth Tudor.

2)   GREAT MARIA, by Cecilia Holland, my favorite Holland novel, out now.

3)   FOR THE KING’S FAVOR, by Elizabeth Chadwick, September 1^st; this was published in the UK as THE TIME OF SINGING.  Sourcebooks has already published Elizabeth’s excellent TO DEFY A KING, set in King John’s reign, and her acclaimed novels about William Marshal, THE GREATEST KNIGHT and THE SCARLET LION.

4)   HAWK OF MAY, by Gillian Bradshaw, the first book in her Arthurian trilogy, September.

5)   DESIREE, by Annemarie Selinko, October 1^st; I read this as a teenager and developed a huge crush on Napoleon, of all men!

6)   ELIZABETH, CAPTIVE PRINCESS, by Margaret Irwin, October 1^st, the second in her trilogy about Elizabeth Tudor.

7)   FOREVER QUEEN, by Helen Hollick, November 1^st; this is her novel about Queen Emma with a new title, and I can recommend it highly.

8)  A BLOODY FIELD BY SHREWSBURY, by Edith Pargeter, November 1^st; this is my favorite Pargeter novel, considered a classic by many.

9)  CHILD OF THE NORTHERN SPRING, by Persia Woolley; this is the first in her wonderful trilogy about Guinevere.

10)  LADY OF HAY by Barbara Erskine, October 1^st; I haven’t read it, but I know many readers loved it. 

        The above books are reprints.  Sourcebooks is also publishing Susan Higginbotham’s new novel about Margaret of Anjou, titled QUEEN OF LAST HOPES, in January, 2011.  And here’s a novel about Richard III that is already out, THIS TIME, by Joan Szechtman.  As many of you know, I usually do not read other writers’ novels about “my” characters; after living with them for so long, I tend to get rather possessive!  But Joan’s novel is near the top of my TBR pile, which is almost scraping the ceiling by now, for it has a very clever premise–Richard is transported from Bosworth Field and into our time.  It has gotten enthusiastic reviews from people whose opinions I respect, including Brian Wainwright, author of the excellent WITHIN THE FETTER-LOCK, a novel of Constance of York, and the fiendishly clever Ricardian spoof, THE ADVENTURES OF ALIANORE AUDLEY.    I’m looking forward to reading it as soon as I complete LIONHEART, and I am happy to report that Joan is busy at work on a sequel.    Another Ricardian novel on the horizon is Anne Easter Smith’s QUEEN BY RIGHT, about Cecily Neville, to be published in May of 2011; Anne, of course, is the author of three other historical novels, A ROSE FOR THE CROWN, about Richard III, DAUGHTER OF YORK, about his sister Margaret, Duchess of Burgundy, and THE KING’S GRACE, about Perkin Warbeck. 

        Detouring into the twelfth century, it has been a busy year for Eleanor of Aquitaine.  Cecilia Holland has a new novel out about her, titled THE SECRET ELEANOR.   In the spring, Christy English’s THE QUEEN’S PAWN, came out.   And Elizabeth Chadwick intends to write about Eleanor after her novel about the Empress Maude/Matilda, LADY OF THE ENGLISH, is published.     

       I am not done doing damage to your bank accounts.  Margaret George will have a new novel out next April, ELIZABETH I.  And in February a novel is coming out that I really loved.  It is called EXIT THE ACTRESS by Priya Parmar, and is a delightful account of the love affair between Charles II and the most famous and appealing of his mistresses, Nell Gwyn.   And since I proclaimed LEGACY to be the best novel I’ve read about Elizabeth Tudor to date, I might as well do the same for Norah Lofts’s THE CONCUBINE, for I think it is the best novel written about Anne Boleyn.  I also have news about three of my favorite mystery writers.  Lindsey Davis has a new Falco mystery coming out at the end of August, NEMESIS; it is already published in the UK.  Priscilla Royal’s latest, VALLEY OF DRY BONES, comes out on November 2^nd, and we have another Margaret Frazer to look forward to, A PLAY OF PIETY, which will be published on December 7^th.

        In previous blogs, I’ve often mentioned the various chronicles that I’ve been using for LIONHEART, and I’ve been asked for additional information about them.   I highly recommend them, for they offer an amazingly intimate glimpse into the medieval world.  THE CHRONICLE OF THE THIRD CRUSADE is a translation by Helen J. Nicholson of The Itinerarium Peregrinorum et Gesta Regis Ricardi.  I was able to get two translations of Ambroise’s Estoire de la Guerre Sainte, but I would suggest going with the most recent one, THE HISTORY OF THE HOLY WAR, translated by Marianne Ailes.  The other side is represented by THE RARE AND EXCELLENT HISTORY OF SALADIN, written by Baha al-Din ibn Shaddad, a member of Saladin’s inner circle, translated by D. S. Richards, and by THE CHRONICLE OF IBN AL-ATHIR FOR THE CRUSADING PERIOD,THE YEARS 541-589/1146-1193: THE AGE OF NUR AL-DIN AND SALADIN, also translated by D. S. Richards.  For those who read French, there is CONQUETE DE LA SYRIE ET DE LA PALESTINE PAR SALADIN, written by another of the sultan’s intimates, Imad al-Din al-Isfahani, translated by Henri Masse.   There are a number of other chronicles, too, of course—Roger de Hoveden and William of Newburgh and the snarky Richard of Devizes, who sniped that Berengaria was “probably” still a virgin when she and Richard left Sicily for the Holy Land.  When I compose a reading list of the books I consulted for Lionheart, I will put it up on my website, but I am holding off until the novel is done. 

          For those who’d like to read about Richard’s reign before Lionheart is published next year, John Gillingham remains the gold-standard for biographies of Richard I; his primary biography was published in 1999, and he has also written numerous articles about Richard, many of which are included in RICHARD COEUR DE LION, KINGSHIP, CHIVALRY, AND WAR IN THE TWELFTH CENTURY.  Frank McLynn has also written a biography of Richard and John; in the US, it is titled RICHARD AND JOHN, KINGS AT WAR, and in the UK, LIONHEART AND LACKLAND.  I have not read the half of the book pertaining to John, so I can’t comment upon it, but I have found very few errors in the half devoted to Richard.  A much older biography of Richard by Kate Norgate has stood the test of time surprisingly well.  And I highly recommend the biography of Eleanor of Aquitaine by the British historian Ralph Turner. 

      There are so many books written about the Crusades, although oddly, not specifically about the Third Crusade.  The best that I’ve read so far is Thomas Asbridge’s THE CRUSADES: THE AUTHORITATIVE HISTORY OF THE WAR FOR THE HOLY LAND.  I may not always agree with his conclusions, but his research is very compre-hensive and if you want to read only one book about the crusades, this is the book.   The definitive account of the crusades from Saladin’s point of view remains Malcolm Cameron Lyons and D.E. P Jackson’s SALADIN, THE POLITICS OF THE HOLY WAR.  I also recommend Carole Hillenbrand’s THE CRUSADES, ISLAMIC PER-SPECTIVES, and David Nicolle’s CRUSADER WARFARE, VOLUME II, MUSLIMS, MONGOLS, AND THE STRUGGLE AGAINST THE CRUSADES.  Before this list gets totally out of hand for a blog entry, I will confine myself to mentioning just a few others, books that focus upon the brutality of medieval warfare:  Sean McClynn’s BY SWORD AND FIRE, Yvonne Friedman’s ENCOUNTERS BETWEEN ENEMIES, and NOBLE IDEALS AND BLOODY REALITIES, edited by Niall Christie and Maya Yazigi. 

        Sadly, many of the above books are rather expensive, but thank God for libraries.  I was recently horrified to hear that Camden, New Jersey was going to close all of its libraries by year’s end as a drastic budget-cutting measure; Camden is one of the poorest cities in the country and this would be a devastating loss for its citizens.  Fortunately, it now looks as if something may be worked out.  I cannot imagine a city without a library, nor would I want to; just as an aside, my favorite Founding Father, Ben Franklin, is often given credit for establishing the first public lending library in the United States.  And by pure serendipity, Stacy Schiff, the author of a wonderful book about Ben Franklin, titled A GREAT IMPROVISATION: FRANKLIN, FRANCE, AND THE BIRTH OF AMERICA, is also the author of a new biography coming out in November likely to be of interest to many of my readers, titled CLEOPATRA, A LIFE     Obviously I have not read all of the fiction I’ve mentioned in this blog, but they are all books that I thought worthy of bringing to your attention. 

      Lastly, I have a favor to ask.  We are seeking to make all of my books available in the e-book format, no easy task at times, for the writer has no say in the matter.   This is particularly important for WHEN CHRIST AND HIS SAINTS SLEPT since it is the first book in my trilogy about Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine.  I would be very grateful if you could stop by Amazon.com,  http://www.amazon.com/When-Christ-His-Saints-Slept/dp/0345396685/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1282358719&sr=1-3, and click onto that feature that says “Tell the publisher you’d like to see this book as a Kindle.”  St Martins is currently trying to get HERE BE DRAGONS restored as a Kindle, after being dropped for reasons none of us understand, so maybe you could also do the same on the DRAGONS page.   I certainly will thank you and probably Llywelyn and Joanna would, too, if they were magically transported from the 12^th century and somehow comprehended that the books laboriously copied out by monks can now be downloaded to computers in the blink of an eye.   I wonder how Joan Szechtman’s Richard copes with such modern marvels in THIS TIME?

August 21, 2010                                                              

       I apologize for taking so long to get a new blog up; naturally I am going to blame Coeur de Lion, who doesn’t want his scribe doing anything but catering to his royal whims.  (Typical Angevin)  But I am making it up to you with a particularly interesting and entertaining interview with Nan Hawthorne, author of An Involuntary King: A Tale of Anglo Saxon England.   Nan is also one of my favorite bloggers; in fact, you can find the links to her blogs under Author on my regular website page.  I can’t add the link again here because I have to copy and paste her interview and Melusine, my evil-minded computer, can’t do two tasks at once; at least that is what she claims.   So here is Nan’s interview, and I will add the link to her blog in the comments section, for your convenience.    Enjoy!

Interview with Author Nan Hawthorne

SKP:  I met you, Nan, when you posted something wonderfully funny on one of my blog posts.  Are you always this funny?

NH:  Yes, except in battle scenes.  Spilling guts are rarely humorous.

SKP:  There, that’s what I mean.  So tell me about your novel, An Involuntary King: A Tale of Anglo Saxon England.

NH:  Ah, my favorite subject.  When a friend and I were no more than eleven and twelve, we met at a week long summer camp and started acting out a story.  It began as Indian Princess Sunshine and an Indian brave whose name I don’t call.  I always played the male characters in Pretend.    When we decided to change the story to a sort of generic medieval romance adventure, I got to be a king, namely “King Lawrence” named after our mutual favorite movie, Lawrence of Arabia.  Since we did not live in the same town, my friend and I started writing letters between Lawrence and Sunshine.  We took pity on the royal couple and started writing stories so they could actually be in the same room together and not forced to write letters.  Thus the stories began that years later I would turn into a novel.

SKP:    You said “generic medieval” but your novel is set in a fictional kingdom in eighth century Anglo Saxon England.  How did you decide that time period?

NH:  Not long after we started writing actual stories, I decided I wanted a set time frame.  I was under the impression, mind you I was fourteen then, that “Dark Ages” meant absolutely nothing was known until Charlemagne became Holy Roman Emperor in 800.  I thought it would be safe to put our stories before that as no one could say “That didn’t happen!”  Of course, plenty is known about that era, but since I don’t pretend Críslicland ever really existed, I left it in the eighth century, roughly Lincolnshire.

SKP:  How did you happen to decide to write the stories as a novel?

NH:  I started a Yahoogroup about fifteen years ago called Ghostletters.  On it you can post stories or letters as fictional or historical characters.  I decided to use my old characters, started rewriting some of the stories and discovered I really enjoyed it and was a much better writer after 35 years.  For one thing, my obsession with sex in my adolescence meant uninformed love scenes.. and now since I have had sex, I could really write about it!  As I rewrote I began to see a novel developing, and the rest is, to coin a phrase, historical fiction.

SKP:  You obviously set about learning about Anglo Saxon England when writing An Involuntary King.

NH:  Not at first.  I have castles and knights and all sorts of anachronisms in the first rewrites, but as I wrote I learned, soaking up everything I could find.  I fell in love with the era in the process.  So now instead of castles and knights I have timber fortresses and shield walls.

SKP:  Now I understand that you are blind.  How did you do the research?

NH:  I have no central vision.  As Steven Wright said, I’m a “peripheral visionary”.  I can’t just pick up a book and read, which, to get deathly serious on you for a moment, is the great regret of my book crazy life.  You can imagine that the books produced “for the blind” don’t focus heavily on the areas in which I am interested.  The Internet is a marvel, turning much of the professional world into a level playing field.  I found material on line and discovered pretty quickly that most experts are only too happy to answer questions from people sincerely interested in their arcanity.  I found people, some of which became friends, with knowledge of the era, most  notably Jack Graham who is a brilliant battle scene choreographer.    I owe a lot to Jack, and I continue to rack up that particular debt.

SKP:  Why “involuntary” in the title?

NH:  You are asking what the novel is about.  In a nutshell, a younger son of an Anglo Saxon king finds himself on the throne, having to prove himself.  The novel takes the story from that point through his marriage, the challenges to his authority, his wife’s tendency to attract admirers like the “tragi-nasty” villain of the piece, a Breton  mercenary, a couple different usurpings, how the royal couple’s friends chip in to save the day, and how it all turns out in the end.

SKP:  Is this really historical fiction per se?

NH:  “Period fiction” may be a more accurate term.  It’s not fantasy.  There is no supernatural element.  Period fiction seems to be applied more often to romance novels, and strictly speaking, my novel is not a romance.  Yes, Críslicland never existed, and there were never a King Lawrence or the similarly anachronistically named Queen Josephine, but other than those tributes to the old stories from my adolescence, I did everything I could to make the novel historical.  It’s just in a class by itself, I guess.

SKP:  Where can people find An Involuntary King?

NH:  It’s on Amazon.com including on Kindle, and as an ebook on Smashwords.com.  Since the paperback is not available outside North America, I recommend  the Smashwords ebook which is considerably less dear as well.

SKP:  Do you have any future novels planned?

NH:  Tons.  Right now I am working on a novel set around the time of the disastrous Crusade of 1101 which features a woman who goes to the crusade disguised as her late twin brother.  Finally a female character I can relate to!  That is precisely why I am writing it.  It’s also fun to write vulgar dialogue for historical figures like Raymond of Toulouse and Stephen of Blois.

SKP:  You are involved in an awful lot of projects.  Do you ever sleep?

NH:  <laughs> Oh, yes, I am a recreational sleeper.  I just have a hard time saying no to myself.  I have a blog of all the stories that went into An Involuntary King, one of reviews called That’s All She Read that also covers the topic of accessible reading.  I just got a song I wrote about characters in my novel recorded by Celtic musician Druidsong.  Oh heck, it would take less time and space just to invite your readers to my web site, www.nanhawthorne.com .

SKP:  Anything you would like to add, Nan?

NH:  Yes!  I adore your novels.  The Welsh trilogy especially.  Cried my eyes out, which I love to do.

SKP:  Thanks for talking with me!

NH:  Thank you for asking.  It’s an honor and privilege that you even know who I am.  I’m not worthy, I’m not worthy!  Picture me bowing and scraping.

July 31, 2010

I have some important news about Lionheart.   Some of you may have wondered how I was going to finish the book by year’s end since Richard is still bogged down in the Holy Land, fighting Saladin.   I wondered about that, too.  Actually, I often felt haunted by that approaching deadline and I became more and more uneasy as the months slipped by.  

      How did I get into such a predicament?  Well, in the past I’d always had three years to do one of my historical “sagas,” but for Lionheart, my contract only allotted two years.  Then I lost several months when I became unexpectedly ill in 2008 and had to cancel my book tour for Devil’s Brood.   It was also Richard’s fault.  If he’d stayed at home where he belonged, I wouldn’t have been faced with such daunting research challenges.  But instead he compiled more medieval frequent flyer miles than Marco Polo—France, Italy, Sicily, Crete, Rhodes, Cyprus, the Holy Land, Austria, and Germany, although in fairness to him, those last two countries were not on his original itinerary.  

        So the research alone could easily have taken two years—and it didn’t help that I am so obsessive-compulsive about research or that the research was so fascinating in its own right.  How could I resist intriguing nuggets of information like these—that the official languages of Sicily were Greek, Arabic, and Latin, that the Kings of Sicily kept harems, that medieval men called the Mediterranean the “Greek Sea,” that Cyprus had no walled towns or navigable rivers, that residents of the Holy Land called bananas “apples of paradise,” enjoyed a dessert of syrup mixed with snow, and adopted the eastern custom of dining on cushions.

        And then there are the amazing chronicles at my disposal, especially two written by men who accompanied Richard on crusade and two by men who were members of Saladin’s inner circle, truly a surfeit of riches.  They often read like battlefield dispatches, offering detailed accounts of the same fight as seen by the crusaders and the Saracens.  They provided me with the names of men slain in a particular battle, with personal quotes from Richard and Saladin, and allowed me to see these two legendary historical figures through the eyes of men who actually knew them.  They described Richard’s mood on his wedding day, Saladin’s bouts with colic, Richard’s love for a Cypriot stallion named Fauvel, Saladin’s kindness to a Christian woman whose child had been stolen by thieves.   So it has been a very enjoyable experience—tracking the Lionheart from Marseille to Messina to Famagusta to Acre—but there was always that accursed deadline looming on the horizon.

         I needed a knight in shining armor to ride to my rescue, and they are in short supply in the 21^st century.  Fortunately, I had something better than a knight errant, a dear friend who shares my love of history in general and the MA in particular.  Valerie LaMont is the sister I’d always wanted to have.  My Facebook friends know that her husband Lowell exorcises my computer’s demons.  Well, Valerie has exorcised my deadline demons by coming up with an idea that was so simple and yet so brilliant.  Why not tell Richard’s story in two parts?

        I don’t know why this hadn’t occurred to me.  After all, it is the modus operandi I’ve used in the past for my Welsh trilogy and the Angevin trilogy.  And Richard’s life lends itself admirably to such an approach.  Happily, my publisher thinks so, too.   This is my news then—that I will be writing two more books about the Angevins.   Lionheart will deal with the Richard of legend, Coeur de Lion, ending as he departs the Holy Land and sails for home in October of 1192.  He leaves with reluctance and regret, for he sees the crusade as a failure since they were unable to recapture Jerusalem; he even denies himself the chance to visit the Holy City with his fellow crusaders and promises the new King of Jerusalem that he will be back.  Of course he has no idea what lies ahead—an unlikely encounter with pirates, shipwreck, capture, imprisonment, ransom, and betrayal.  Lionheart will be published by Putnam’s next year, probably in the autumn, and I expect the British publication will also be in 2011.  The second book, A King’s Ransom, will focus upon the man behind the myth, covering those improbable adventures on Richard’s homeward journey and the remaining years of his reign; we hope to publish it in 2012.  Yes, I will actually have two books coming out in consecutive years!

         This is one of those rare win-win situations.  It saves my sanity.  It keeps me from missing a deadline by a year or more, never a good thing.  I am spared the danger of having to race through the last part of the story in a mad rush to finish the book on time.  Now I will be able to spare more time for the remarkable ensemble cast in A King’s Ransom.  Richard’s devious, damaged brother John, flawed enough to be fascinating. His mother, the incomparable Eleanor of Aquitaine.  His favorite sister, Joanna, who was the daughter most like Eleanor.  His half-brother Geoff, whose career as Archbishop of York was almost as stormy as Thomas Becket’s.   Everyone’s favorite knight, William Marshal.  Richard’s mortal enemy, the French king.  Heinrich von Hohenstaufen, the Holy Roman Emperor, who may be the most unsympathetic character I’ve ever written about—and considering the rogue’s galley that has infiltrated my books, that is saying a lot. The prideful Duke of Austria; Richard’s greatest mistake may have been offending Leopold at the siege of Acre.   Richard’s sinister second-in-command, the mercenary captain, Mercadier.  Ranulf’s son Morgan; I had to have at least one Welsh character in the book!   Constance of Brittany, still grieving for her first husband, Geoffrey.  And of course Richard’s queen, Berengaria, a woman who was dealt a bad hand and played it as best and bravely as she could.  

      As you can tell, I am very happy about this development.  I hope you all will be, too, and I am looking forward to your responses.  Lastly, I have not had a chance yet to respond to some of your queries in comments posted for the last blog, Really Random Thoughts, but I will do so on that blog. 

July 2, 2010      

         I’m sorry for the delay in posting a new blog, but life in Outremer has gotten very busy lately.   Richard did something rather remarkable about two weeks ago.  Well, my Richard did; the real Richard did it in October of 1191.  After the battle of Arsuf, he sent the ineffectual King of Jerusalem, Guy de Lusignan (yes, one of those de Lusignans) back to Acre to collect their truant soldiers, who’d preferred to loiter in that sinful port city’s taverns and brothels rather than take part in a grueling 80 mile march under constant harassment by Saladin’s men.   Guy, not surprisingly, failed; the chronicler Ambroise says they “responded with indifference.”   So Richard went storming back to Acre to corral the miscreants himself, and not surprisingly, he succeeded.  That wasn’t the remarkable part; Richard was like a force of nature in one of his Angevin tempers.  But when he returned to Jaffa, he brought his queen and his sister with him.

         Now Saladin had destroyed Jaffa rather than let it fall intact into Richard’s hands.  So this meant Berengaria and Joanna and their ladies were trading life in the royal palace at Acre for a tent in an army encampment.  Clearly Acre was both safer and more comfortable for them.  But Richard wanted them with him, which indicates that he and Beregaria were getting along well, at least in the honeymoon stage of their marriage.

      When I posted this on Facebook, a few readers seemed unhappy with this conclusion, although they could not come up with another plausible reason for his action.   I am finding it quite interesting that Coeur de Lion stirs such passions so many centuries after his death.  From some of the feedback I’ve been getting, I’ve concluded that there are readers who have made up their minds about Richard and they don’t seem comfortable  having their views challenged.  As I’ve said before, my research about Richard was something of a revelation to me, for the Richard I discovered was often at odds with the Richard of myth.  The “Richard of myth” was the Richard who makes a brief appearance in Here Be Dragons, for I did not do substantial research about him for that book, in part because he was only a “bit player” and in part because I was not quite as obsessive-compulsive about such things back then; sadly, now I feel obligated to drag out the books even for characters with walk-on roles.   

         By the time I was writing Devil’s Brood, I had a different view of Richard, and the king in Lionheart is not substantially different from the rebellious younger son in DB.  He gets much more time on center stage, of course, and I will be focusing upon aspects of his personality that were neglected in DB.  For example, his sense of humor; he was so caught up in the family feuding in DB that he was usually in a hostile frame of mind.  Now that he is king, he has more time to indulge the Angevin flair for irony and sarcasm, which Henry seems to have passed on to all his sons.   I found it very interesting that Saladin’s chronicler, Baha al-Din, reported that in their talks with Richard, he had a bantering style of speaking, half-serious, half-in-jest.   I feel truly blessed to have such rich resources to draw upon for this book, no less than three Saracen chronicles and half a dozen from Richard’s side.   For a writer to be able to get first-person accounts of a medieval battle is amazing in and of itself; to be able to read both Saracen and crusader accounts of that same battle is as good as it gets for a historical novelist!  

         So Berengaria and Joanna and the Damsel of Cyprus have joined Richard at Jaffa.  Their ladies in waiting are not as happy about this adventure, but then they didn’t get a vote; I have one of them grumbling about queens having to live like camp followers.  I’ve certainly spilled enough fictional blood in the course of my books, but this is the first time that I’ve had women actually on the front lines.  Joanna and Berengaria were witnesses to Richard’s first battle on Cyprus, and I enjoyed being able to describe events from a female perspective for once.   I can still sympathize with their ladies, though, having to give up the comforts of Acre for a more Spartan life in an army camp.  But Richard’s success in rounding up his fugitive soldiers was fleeting.   It wasn’t long before ships began turning up at Jaffa, filled with Acre prostitutes following their customers.  

        That is the latest dispatch from Outremer.   Now I want to remind readers that the new P.F. Chisholm mystery, A Murder of Crows, was published by the Poisoned Pen Press on June 1st, and they are having what is sure to be a very lively convention on June 24-25, attended by P.F. Chisholm, who also writes historical novels as Patricia Finney, and an impressive galley of authors, including two of my own favorite writers, Diana Gabaldon and Dana Stabenow.  Here is their website with information about the conference; I am so sorry that I will not be able to be there.   But book lovers within driving distance of Scottsdale, Arizona should mark these dates on the calendar.   Oh, and it’s free, too!    http://www.poisonedpenblog.com/2010/04/poisoned-pen-conference-so-far.html   A Murder of Crows is the fifth mystery about Robert Carey, Elizabeth Tudor’s real-life cousin; his father was the love child of Henry VIII and Mary Boleyn.   (Is it just me or does anyone else think it was really tacky of Henry to bed sisters?)    The mysteries are always well plotted and readers really do feel as if they are walking the streets of Elizabethan London with Robert Carey, his dour Sergeant Dodd, and a balding young poet named Will Shakespeare who may or may not be a spy himself.   

       I’d also like to recommend a few websites that I’ve already mentioned on my various Facebook pages.  I know some of you are leery of Facebook (I once was, too), but it is worth joining just to have access to the spectacular photos that readers have been posting on my Facebook Fan Club page of Wales and other places that were featured in my books.     Here is the website for my favorite Welsh photographer, Dave O’Shea; Dave is a good friend who took several of the jacket photos for my books, including my favorite shot at Dolwyddelan Castle, which we used for When Christ and His Saints Slept.    Dave captures the soul of Wales better than any photographer I’ve ever seen, and deserves some credit for my Welsh trilogy, as my house is decorated with his photos and I draw upon them for inspiration whenever I write about Wales. And yes, he does ship overseas!        http://www.artistik.co.uk/

        This next recommendation has nothing to do with the MA or books, but it is a remarkable glimpse of history, and when I posted it on Facebook, I got a huge, enthusiastic response, so I wanted to share it with my blogging buddies, too.   It is a three minute video of VJ Day in Honolulu, Hawaii, August 14, 1945.  It is very moving to see the joy of these young soldiers and sailors as they celebrate the end of the war.   http://vimeo.com/5645171

        I’d also like to recommend one of my favorite blogs, written by Nan Hawthorne, author of An Involuntary King, a Tale of Anglo-Saxon England.    Nan’s blog tells us what happened on any given date in the MA; always useful to know, right?   And as a bonus, she has a delightfully snarky sense of humor; for example, she notes on May 18, 1152 that Henry wed “a French divorcee.”   http://todayinmedievalhistory.blogspot.com/

        And Online Classes sent me an interesting article they posted on their website, in which they selected the 100 best historical fiction novels.   Here is the link.  http://www.onlineclasses.org/2010/06/01/100-all-time-best-historical-fiction-books/     A list like this is always a good way to get a discussion and/or argument going.  I found many of my favorites there, some that surprised me, and one shocking omission—To Kill a Mockingbird.    Anyone who loves books and history—and that includes every last one of us—will want to check out the list.   And yes, one of mine made the cut, but you’ll have to see for yourselves which one!

        Lastly, I am happy to report that Shadow, the new addition to my family, is thriving.  I thought I knew all about Velcro dogs, having had three poodles, but Shadow makes them seem like aloof, canine Greta Garbos; I call him the love-sponge.   He has made amazing progress in just six weeks, proving what I’ve always suspected—that the world would be a better place if people shared the dog’s gift for forgiving. 

         I just realized that I neglected to ask any questions in this blog.  So feel free to pitch in with any random thoughts of your own, be they about the Angevins, the new Robin Hood film, your favorite and not so favorite books, that sickening oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, rescued dogs like Shadow, the World Cup and why Americans are the only people in the world to call it soccer, the ending of Lost, why the Tudors have managed to get such a stranglehold on the public imagination….Well, you can see I am casting a wide net here.

June 13, 2010