Sharon: I am very pleased to have this chance to interview Priscilla Royal, whose medieval mysteries have long been favorites of mine. We share many of the same readers, so I know this will be a popular interview. And Priscilla has generously agreed to do another book giveaway. To enter, you have only to post an entry on this blog. The winner will receive a signed copy of The Proud Sinner. Now before we get started on the new book, Priscilla, you said you have two announcements you are eager to make.
Priscilla: My first book in the series, Wine of Violence, is being reissued in specially identified trade paperback and e-reader versions on February 3, 2017. The edition is special because one of the finest historical novelists of our time, Sharon Kay Penman, was generous enough to write a new Introduction for it. Am I thrilled? For once, I’m without words. Thank you, Sharon, for taking the time to do this. As I have already told you, I am deeply honored.
Poisoned Pen Press is also publishing a volume of short stories by 35 of their writers to celebrate the twentieth anniversary of the press. It is called Bound by Mystery: Celebrating 20 Years of Poisoned Pen Press. It will be out in trade paperback on March 7, 2017. Included is my only short story, The Paternoster Pea. It is Prioress Eleanor’s first case and written long before the series began to see if she and I could get along as character and author. It worked, and we are happily engaged in a long collaboration.
Sharon: I was delighted when Poisoned Pen asked me to write the Forward for this new edition of Wine of Violence. I still remember how much I enjoyed my first reading of Wine, for I knew I wanted to keep visiting Tyndal Priory and its inhabitants. I plan to post the first chapter of Wine of Violence in a later blog so those of you who’ve not yet read it can see for yourselves what you’ve been missing. But for now, it is the Proud Sinner on center stage, the latest in your medieval mystery series. Tell us about it.
Priscilla: As readers, we are often intrigued by where fiction authors get their inspirations. I find my best ideas usually arrive when I am trying least to come up with something.
The Proud Sinner was inspired by watching the 1965 movie version of Dame Agatha Christie’s book retitled And Then There Were None after the original title was thankfully junked. This film, Ten Little Indians, is the one with Fabian. (Yes, him, for those old enough to remember. Awful actor but fun.) The plot involves characters marooned on an island. All are killed. So who was the murderer? Not only did I reread the book, but I watched all movie versions. You can imagine what hard work it was to do that!
Although I am not the clever writer Christie was, and pompously didn’t like her ending, I thought it would be fun to strand a group of querulous abbots, each of whom could easily epitomize one of the seven deadly sins, in one of the worst recorded winters in English history at Tyndal Priory. As they sicken and die, one by one, and Sister Anne is mystified by the causes, the terrified abbots begin to point fingers at each other and grow violent. The ending, however, is not Christie’s. That’s as much as I’ll say!
Sharon: In each of your books, you have chosen to highlight some aspect of the medieval era. What is highlighted in The Proud Sinner and why this particular choice?
Priscilla: After delving into the coin-clipping pogrom against English Jews in Land of Shadows, I needed a short break from murderous bigotry that was beginning to feel a bit too modern. Even though I love drawing characters, I decided to concentrate on a more devious plot as a craft challenge. My editor suggested I highlight medieval food, something which is often assumed to be bland, putrid, and not exactly healthy. For those of us who grew up after WWII, the English diet we knew suffered horribly from rationing and shortages. The medieval diet did not. Meat was usually fresh, often killed the same day as eaten. Spices enhanced meals, as they do today, and were never intended to disguise rotten food. Middle Eastern cuisine, especially the spices like saffron, was brought back by the crusaders. Queen Eleanor of Castile introduced recipes from her native land as well as carpets. Vegetables and fruit were fresh, local, and organic. So I integrated monastic food habits into the book, as well as meals found in inns, and threw in a little lethal element as extra spice.
Sharon: This is the thirteenth book about Prioress Eleanor and Brother Thomas, yet you have kept the series fresh. How have you done that?
Priscilla: Thank you for the compliment! As a reader, I start to get bored with a series when the author seems to be doing so or the voice loses freshness. Of course, I won’t mention names, but there is one writer I still read because the plotting remains excellent, but the main character hasn’t changed in years. Yet readers, and I’m among them, long for one more story even when the authors are so sick of the main characters they want to kill them off. Example is Conon Doyle with Sherlock Holmes who had to bring him back from death because readers demanded it—and he also found it hard to turn down the royalties.
One way I try to keep my series fresh is to take chances. Prioress Eleanor and Brother Thomas continue to evolve. I give them vacations by highlighting the stories of major secondary characters, a lesson I learned from reading Ian Rankin. On occasion, I introduce new secondaries, like Eleanor’s young maid, and give old secondaries new roles like my prioress’ former maid who married the crowner. Most importantly, from my viewpoint, I still find all my characters as interesting as old friends.
A series must have a natural ending, but characters, pacing, and voice determine that. The Swedish masters, Sjöwall and Wahlöö, saw each of the ten novels in their Beck series as chapters in one larger book, called The Story of a Crime. For my series, I set up a very long arc of novel-chapters. So if a reader wants more of a character or feels a story line is left incomplete, I can pretty much promise that they will get their wish or find the desired resolution in due course.
Sharon: You have chosen to age your characters normally over the series which means they must change. How have you done this with Prioress Eleanor and Brother Thomas?
Priscilla: Each stage in our lives has a different emphasis and strength. Youth may lack experience, but it offers society fresh ideas and direction. Middle age is often centered in family and the drive to succeed in the world. The later years include reflection and perspective. Prioress Eleanor is no longer the young woman in Wine of Violence but an experienced business woman, clever solver of mysteries, and someone who is learning to be a worldly diplomat. She has entered the second stage of her life. Brother Thomas has traveled a different path, but he, too, has entered that second stage. The priory members have become his family and the suffering his children. Yet he still longs to bond with another man. One thing he has learned at Tyndal is that love owns many manifestations. His struggle now is to still find a way to form that loving bond but within a medieval God’s law. Like many in any era, he is beginning to suspect that a rigid Deity is more the product of mortal men’s imagination and the real one might have some flexibility. Aelred of Rievaulx discovered that. Brother Thomas might too.
Sharon: What are you working on next?
Priscilla: I’m a bit of a contrarian, often choosing topics less well-known because few others have used them in stories. When I got intrigued with the many military Orders during the crusades, I opted to concentrate on the Hospitallers, not the Templars, and found them much more intriguing. So the next book will take Prioress Eleanor, Brother Thomas and Sister Anne to Minchin-Buckland Preceptory in Somerset, the only priory of Hospitaller nuns in England to which a small commandery of Hospitaller brothers is attached. When the trio arrives, they discover that the prioress they expected to meet has been judged guilty of murder. Although the woman has never contested this verdict against her, she now begs the Prioress of Tyndal to prove her innocence after reading the private letter carried by Eleanor to her from Baron Hugh. What was in the letter than made the condemned woman change her plea? And who did kill the victim, a woman hated by so many that the suspects were all too numerous?
Sharon: How can readers contact you?
Priscilla: Should anyone have questions about my books, they can reach me through my website at www.priscillaroyal.com. And I am one of several mystery writers blogging every other Tuesday on The Lady Killers at www.theladykillers.typepad.com
Thank you so much, Sharon, for inviting me to your blog. You are truly a modern day bard, and I am honored to be one of your interviewees!
Sharon: It was my pleasure, Priscilla. I hope you will come back for your next book!
February 17, 2017
Great reading! Thanks for the post.
Free book…..my poor arse living in the ghetto can’t afford books. So commenting. Need free book. Technically I have 500 still to read from before I became poor, but, still, free book!
I Adore your books, so well written, I have to ration myself to one per month as I just found you and am dreading getting to the last one and then having to wait for the next one to be published.
I absolutely love your books! Good stories, great characters with depth. I enjoy their development as much as the mysteries. Can’t wait for the next one! Brother Thomas and Prioress Eleanor are like old friends.
I haven’t read any of her books yet but am looking forward to doing so♥
I love the Prioress Eleanor and Brother Thomas mysteries. Everyone of them are great reads, I look forward to the new book coming out
I have had to expand my TBR list to include Ms Royal’s books for they sound very exciting! Now if I could just find more time to read (so sayeth the flock!)
I am now intrigued to read these books! My Facebook group have always recommended them, but you often have such a backlog of ‘books to be read’ that taking on a new author doesn’t happen! I have loved mysteries before set in the ecclesiastical context and can’t wait to try these now! Thank you Oriscilla and Sharon.
Fabulous interview. Love Priscilla’s books and would be honored to win one. Thank you for the chance.
Have not had thee pleasure of reading any of your books, but would certainly love to.
Enjoyed the interview!
Glad I have another great author to add to my audiobooks!
A wonderful interview. I love this series and can’t wait to read all of the novel-chapters. Thank you Sharon and Priscilla for sharing more of your “behind the scenes” of being an author.
Excited to be introduced to an author whose work I’ve yet to read. I’ll be hunting down Priscilla’s books…Thanks
Must read these!
This interview was of great interest to me because it was done by two of my favourite authors. I always enjoy any insight into the way stories evolve. I’m looking forward to the new book by Ms Priscilla and wish good health and happy writing to you both
Great interview!
I’ve never read a book by Pricilla Royal. I’m now headed over to Good Reads to find out more.
Thank you!
Thank you for writing your transporting stories. I love going back in time with intelligent people like your characters, who survive the most intense challenges. And I return to my time invigorated and ready to follow my life’s route with more empathy for my fellow travelers.
Sorry about the loss of your friend.
Fantastic interview. I can certainly relate to needing a break from topics that seem too, well, topical right now. I love hearing from authors about their writing process and thoughts. Thank you for sharing!
Thanks, Sharon, for your lists of favorite authors! Was introduced to Priscilla Royal that way. Have read all of her books thanks to you! Awaiting her next one! Write quickly, Priscilla!
Your idea of abbots dying at a priory is so intriguing, I can hardly wait to read it and pass it on. By the way, you are a better writer!
I have yet to read Ms. Royal’s books, but look forward to them thanks to Sharon’s blog, interview and recommendation!
Cheers,
Dan W.
Looking forward to your new book! Good interview!
I am looking forward to reading this series!
I know reading is subjective; hey, rumor has it that there are people out there who do not like my books! But I am confident that new readers of Priscilla’s medieval mysteries will not be disappointed.
I would like to thank you all again for your expressions of sympathy for the loss of a very dear friend, Valerie LaMont. I know some of you were her Facebook friends, too; Valerie had a gift for friendship and will be greatly missed by so many of us.
I have quite a few friends and readers who live in California, so I’ve been concerned by the accounts of those dangerous storms and flooding in the past week. I hope all of you have been able to stay safe.
Since so many of you share my interest in Richard III, I wanted to pass on the news that the University of Leicester will be offering another free on-line course about Richard and his times. Here is the link which contains all the necessary details. And do check out Medievalists.net if you are not familiar with it; it is one of the very best medieval sites on the web. http://www.medievalists.net/2017/02/free-richard-iii-mooc-returns/
I couldn’t agree more about losing interest along with the author – so glad that isn’t the case with these novels! Thanks for sharing your thought process with Sharon and with us!
Many thanks to all of you for such encouraging comments!
Sharon and Pricilla,
Thanks for the interview and I look forward to starting the books by you Pricilla. I adore Sharon’s books and have read them more than once. Anyone she recommends has to be great.
I thought this quiz was fun so I wanted to share it. I’ve visited 36 states and DC, but I bet many of you can top that. My readers seem to be natural-born travelers!
https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/lifestyle/50-states/?hpid=hp_weekend-chain_travel-0225%3Ahomepage%2Fstory
28 states and D.C. You are 8 ahead of me.
I had an advantage, Mac, for I was able to visit some of those states during book tours!
Here is today’s Facebook Post.
I have some interesting writer news for everyone today. First of all, I wanted to remind those who have not yet heard about it that Priscilla Royal is doing a book giveaway for her newest medieval mystery, The Proud Sinner, which has intriguing echoes of the famous Agatha Christie mystery, And Then There Were None. There is still time to enter; simply follow this link to my blog and the interview I did with Priscilla recently and post a comment. As easy as that!
http://sharonkaypenman.com/blog/?p=670
And I have good news for fans of Margaret George’s wonderful historical novels. Her new one is coming out on March 7th, The Confessions of Young Nero. You can pre-order it on Amazon. I was fortunate enough to have the chance to read an ARC and I was riveted from the first page. It is so rare to discover that a well-known historical figure is actually not as he has been portrayed. Margaret has kindly agreed to do an interview on my blog on the publication date and you’ll be able to get a behind-the-scenes glimpse of a writer at work. As a writer myself, I naturally find that fascinating! https://www.amazon.com/Confessions-Young-Nero-Margaret-George-ebook/dp/B01H17U9EQ/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1488145127&sr=1-1&keywords=margaret+george
Fascinating interview, Sharon and Priscilla – I’d love to win a book… Thanks,
Margaret
Oh, go on then. I’d love to win a copy of the book!
Wonderful interview, can’t wait to read Priscilla’s new book! I found her books through your recommendations Sharon, many thanks for that, it’s such a delight to find a new series so well done!
This was a great interview, I’m looking forward to reading the new book!
Can’t wait!
Thank you, Cindy. I will pass this on to Priscilla.
Here is today’s Facebook Note.
After I reminded readers yesterday that the book drawing for Priscilla Royal’s new mystery, The Proud Sinner, is still going on, several people thanked me, saying they had not known about it. So from now until I put up my interview with Margaret George on March 7th, I am going to mention this frequently for the benefit of readers who have not visited my blog or Facebook pages recently.
And for the benefit of those who have not read Stephanie Churchill’s excellent historical fantasy novel, The Scribe’s Daughter, here is an eloquent review of that book by one of her fellow historical fantasy novelists, Mary Anne Yarde. Reviews are very good ways for us to get a sense of what a book is about and to decide if we think it is one we’d like to read. Mary Anne and I agree that The Scribe’s Daughter is definitely in that category!
http://maryanneyarde.blogspot.com/2017/02/bookreview-scribes-daughter.html
If Sharon Kay Penman recommends a book, I want to read it.
I can’t wait to read this book. I’ve read several others in the series, and enjoyed them all.
Would love the opportunity to read this book. Thanks!
I have only read Wine of Violence – started the series on your recommendation, Sharon, and now I really have to get on with the rest of the series!
Thank you Sharon and Priscilla for a very interesting interview.
I love Priscilla’s books and would be thrilled to win her new one please.
Thank you Sharon & Ms Royal for another wonderful interview, always so much fun. Your novels are brilliant & your characters favorites of mine. Today on the Medievalist blog is an article about “the anchoritic life” which we learned about in Juliana’s story in Forsaken Soul.
I’ll post the site below…..to be released by Sharon (thank you).
http://www.medievalists.net/2017/02/enclosure-medieval-female-anchoritism/
I will check to see if it has been snared, Joan.
February 28, 1155 was the birthdate of Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine’s second son, named Henry after his sire. He would go down in history as The Young King although he never truly ruled in his own right, yoked to his father’s will until his untimely death at age 28. At the time of his son’s birth, Henry had been king for barely two months. He and Eleanor had sailed for England in a December gale so violent that sensible men would have stayed in port. I doubt that Eleanor appreciated Henry’s insistence upon crossing the Channel during such a nasty storm, especially since she was seven months pregnant at the time. But Henry prevailed, as he usually did, and even passed on this lunacy gene to his third son, Richard.
I have not had a chance yet to read the new biography of the Young King by the British historian Matthew Strickland. I have long been an admirer of Strickland’s research and have other books of his in my library, but I’ve had to delay reading his biography until after I finish The Land Beyond the Sea. I was somewhat surprised that he even attempted it, for I doubted that there would be enough extant material about the Young King to justify a biography. This was the case when Dr Judith Everhard decided to do a biography about Hal’s brother Geoffrey, Duke of Brittany, and she eventually had to widen the scope of her book, resulting in the magnificent Brittany and the Angevins, which I highly recommend. I am curious if any of my readers have read the Strickland biography of the Young King and if so, what did you think of it?
So excited to find the blog of a long-time favorite author – and even better for this discovery to include a recommendation for a book by another fav!
For all who are lucky enough to have Welsh blood or who love Wales, today is St David’s day, the patron saint of that beautiful country. And ironically, it was also the day in 1244 when Gruffydd, the eldest son of Llywelyn Fawr, died trying to escape from English captivity in the Tower of London. He’d knotted sheets together and tried to climb down, a dizzying distance of ninety feet. Like most of Gruffydd’s plans, it did not go well.
Falls the Shadow, page 206
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When it happened, it was without warning. The ripping noise the rope made as it gave way was muffled by the wind. There was a sudden slackness, and then Gruffydd was falling, plunging backward into blackness. There was a moment or two of awareness, but mercifully no more than that. The last sound he heard was a man’s scream, but he never knew if the scream came from him or from Owain.
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Sharon, I just finished reading Cadfael Chronicle 18, The Summer of the Danes, which includes two of your major characters in Time and Chance, Owain Gruffyd and his son Hywel. As a much younger man in 1144, Owain has a very major rôle. I think Ellis Peters saw these Welsh princes in much the way you did, though Hywel’s character is developed much less than his father’s. I am close to finishing the entire Cadfael cycle.
I really liked the Brother Cadfael books, Mac, with the exception of the very last one, which I thought slandered the Empress Maude. But who wouldn’t love Brother Cadfael?
My favorite English king was born on this date—March 5th, 1133, in the beautiful city of Le Mans, christened in its magnificent cathedral, named Henry after his grandfather. He would prove to be a great king, but a flawed husband and father, and as he lay dying at Chinon Castle, forced to make a humiliating peace by Richard and the French king, shattered by the betrayal of the one son who had most reason to be loyal, his favorite child, John, he must have wondered how it had ever have come to that, wondered how so much bright promise could have ended so bitterly. But on his birthday, I prefer to focus on that beginning. Here are two scenes from When Christ and His Saints Slept. The first one takes place in the stables of the castle at Le Mans, where Maude had gone to demand that her unfaithful husband, the young Count of Anjou, not humiliate her while her brothers were visiting. On her way back to the hall, she became dizzy and was assisted by her cousin Stephen; hey, where would a story be without a seasoning of irony? Page 49
* * *
“I want no daughters,” she said, “not ever.”
Stephen was puzzled by her vehemence. “Matilda recently confided that she might be with child again, and if so, we both hope for a lass this time. Why would you want to deny your-self the pleasure a daughter would bring?”
“Because,” Maude said, “daughters are but pawns, utterly powerless—“
She broke off so abruptly that Stephen knew she’d had another pang. “Is it common to have these pains?”
“The midwife assured me that they come and go in the days before the birthing begins. But the ones I’ve had today have been different, in my back, and I—“ Maude’s mouth contorted, and then an alarmed expression crossed her face. “Jesu!” she cried. “My water has broken!”
Stephen jumped to his feet. “We’d best get you inside straightaway.”
“No…you go in and tell them.” Maude was looking everywhere but at Stephen’s face. “I….I will follow in a moment or so.:
“Maude, that makes no sense!” He stared at her in utter bafflement and had his answer, then, in her crimson cheeks, averted eyes, and sodden skirts. God save the lass, she was em-barrassed! “Sweet cousin, listen. You must come with me. You cannot have your baby in a stable. This is Le Mans, not Bethlehem.”
As he hoped, that won him a flicker of a smile, and she held out her hands, let him help her to her feet. “Take me in, Stephen,” she said. “I doubt you’d make a good midwife…”
* * *
The next scene is on page 52. Maude has given birth to her son, and she and Geoffrey are enjoying a rare moment of marital peace.
* * *
Maude was finding it harder and harder to stay awake, but she was not yet ready to relinquish her son, even for a few hours. “I suppose you still want to name him Fulk, after your father,” she said drowsily.
Geoffrey looked at her, then at the baby. “Well…no,” he said, and Maude’s lashes fluttered upward in surprise. “I know we’ve been quarreling over names, but I’ve changed my mind. You can name him, Maude. I think you’ve earned the right.”
Maude did, too. “Thank you,” she said, and smiled sleepily at her husband and son. The baby chose that moment to open his eyes, and startled them both by letting out a loud, piercing wail. They looked so nonplussed that the midwife and wet nurse started to laugh. And it was then that Minna opened the door and ushered Robert, Ranulf, Stephen, and Matilda into the bedchamber.
Maude was not a woman to find humor in chaos. But for once she did not care about decorum or dignity. Cradling her screaming little son, she said happily, “Come closer so you can hear over his shrieks. I want to present Henry, England’s future king.”
* * *.
I hope to be able to post an interview with Margaret George about her new novel, the Confessions of Young Nero in the next day or so. Margaret is her usual articulate self and I know you all will enjoy reading it. Meanwhile, I want to remind everyone that there is still time to enter the book drawing for Priscilla Royal’s new mystery, The Proud Sinner; just post a comment on my current blog, as easy as that. And now I wanted to share with you Margaret’s own description of her Nero novel. I am also including the link to her Goodreads page.
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Dear Reader,
I’m delighted to bring you my novel about the most fascinating of all Roman emperors—Nero! Despite the challenges, I believe I’ve come as close as possible in revealing the human being behind the legend, painting an accurate psychological portrait of the man who was said to have “fiddled while Rome burned” (he didn’t), sang, played the cithara, and raced chariots (he did), murdered his mother (he did), was debauched and cruel (he wasn’t), and was an extravagant genius (he was). The man he was—unique, conflicted, and dramatic—is eager to tell his story and set the record straight.
In my earlier books, I touched down in Rome in The Memoirs of Cleopatra around a hundred years before Nero, and have gone farther back in time with Helen of Troy but this is the first time I’ve written about the Roman Empire and the same cast of characters as I, Claudius. Many of them may be already familiar to you. Certainly, there are a lot of household names there—Caesar, Caligula, Claudius, Livia, Messalina—and now you can meet them again.
To track down the real Nero, I’ve spent a decade meeting academics, reading, and haunting museums, as well as getting into the mind-set of ancient Romans by attending a gladiator training school on the Appian Way in Rome itself. I am now a certified gladiatrix! (But I wouldn’t stand a chance against Spartacus.)
Along the way I traveled with Nero himself. I hope that you’ll take the journey with me and meet him in The Confessions of Young Nero.
With much appreciation to my dear readers,
Margaret George
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/30687928-the-confessions-of-young-nero
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I’ve read all the Prioress Eleanor books so looking forward to a new one! It was through reading SKP that I learned of author Priscilla Royal. Love both writers.
Hi Sharon,
So glad that I met Priscilla Royal’s books through your telling me about them. Looking forward to reading the new book.
You all have been so incredibly kind about this blog and my books! Wish I could give every one of you a copy!
I do so much reading and yet Priscilla is a new author to me. I’d love to read her new book. Thank you for the chance to win. I’ll have to go look them up. I do love historical fiction
Great interview!
Another great interview
I adore medieval mysteries and these look like good ones. Thank you, Sharon, for introducing me to Priscilla’s work. I look forward to reading a new series! A free book (if I am so lucky) is always nice, too.
Enjoyed this post and getting caught up on some new-to-me reads!
Sharon’s recommendation has seen me just buying a triple book set of Priscilla’s books last night… so excited to be starting another journey with a new author! My last addiction has been Ian Rankin, so I am looking forward to exploring a very different world with Priscilla!
Nice interview of similar souls. Shall have to extend my reading because of this chat – and that’s not a bad thing. Thank you ladies for the inspiration. Take care, stay well.
Enjoyed the interview! Unlike other posters here, I have become one one of your fans because Priscilla Royal was so clearly wowed by your endorsement. Glad to say, she was/is right to hold you & your work in such high esteem.