Word Wenches

Ask A Wench — What We've Been Watching

Anne here, with our regular "Ask a Wench" feature. And today we're responding to this question: Have you watched any good TV shows or movies lately?

Christina said: I haven’t been watching much TV at all as I’ve become obsessed with reading every night during lockdown, but there have been a few shows that I've enjoyed. For some reason I hardly ever read crime novels, but I love watching it on TV and so called “Scandi Noir” really does it for me. It’s dark and gritty and well worth watching. One of my favourites is the Swedish series Beck about an aging Stockholm detective and his team. The crimes may be gruesome on occasion, but there is always humour in these stories as well since the main character Martin has a crazy neighbour called Valdemar who is hilarious. Martin himself is a very sympathetic character and the whole series has a realistic feel to it that I like immensely. 

Another one I’ve really enjoyed is the Icelandic programme Trapped. The first series was set in a small town in northern Iceland during a very cold winter when everyone was snowed in and couldn’t get out because all the roads were closed. That made for a very claustrophobic atmosphere with a killer on the loose and it was incredibly exciting and gripping. The second series was almost as good and I’m hoping there will be more soon. 

I’ve only been to the cinema once in the last two years but I am eagerly awaiting the new sci-fi movie Dune, based on the novels by Frank Herbert. The trailer looks very promising! I first read these books back in high school when I took a course called Futuristic Lit (so much more fun than the classics!) and I was hooked. I really hope this new version does them justice as the first time this was adapted for the cinema the result was very disappointing. Here's a trailer.

Pat said: The Guy and I watch a show every other night when we can. We’ll try new shows that sound interesting or pick up ones others have recommended, but the ones we settle in to watch long term are limited and usually humorous. Right now I’m utterly incensed that Amazon Prime has discontinued New Tricks, my very favorite sit-back-and-enjoy series. It’s about a group of former British police detectives who are brought back to work unsolved cases. The characterization is hilarious as they play off each other—one by-the-book curmudgeon, a neurodivergent genius on meds, a playboy who’s been married more times than I  can count, and the younger female officer who has to keep them reined in. It’s on Britbox now but I haven’t resigned myself to buying a new service for just one show.

An Interview with Susanna Kearsley

Christina here and today it is my very great pleasure to welcome back Wench Emerita Susanna Kearsley to the blog to chat about her new novel, The Vanished Days, which will be published in the US on 5thOctober this year (and in the UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand next spring). It is a prequel and companion novel to The Winter Sea, and partly overlaps with the action in that book. It goes back in time to the 1680s and introduces the reader to the Moray and Graeme families.

 

I have had the honour of reading an ARC of this book, and as always, I was kept spellbound right to the end – it’s absolutely wonderful! It also gave me a very good excuse (as if I needed one!) to reread The Winter Sea, which is one of my all-time favourite novels.

 

Susanna welcome! Please can you give us a brief summary of what The Vanished Days is about and how you came to write it?

 

Witch Hunt

After spending decades unable to settle on one period of history or even one country to write about, I have apparently settled into a niche I enjoy (without using the tarot deck there, thank you!). I suppose it makes sense, if I think about it. I’m a character-driven writer. So instead of creating a career in the history of Regency or Victorian England or the American west or whatever, I have apparently taken root in writing about two distinctly different families through the generations and across continents. This way I don’t feel confined by their environment, and I can explore anywhere I like.

Medicine and Mayhem!

Andrea here, busy polishing up promo material for the release of MURDER AT THE ROYAL BOTANIC GARDENS, my new Wrexford & Sloane mystery, which hits the shelves (virtual and real) on September 28th. I’m thrilled that Publishers Weekly gave it a lovely shout-out, saying, “Swashbuckling…Roars to an exciting climax, followed by a sweet denouement. Historical fans will have fun.”

Here’s the cover blurb: (And you can read an excerpt here!) The upcoming marriage of the Earl of Wrexford and Lady Charlotte Sloane promises to be a highlight of the season, if they can first untangle—and survive—a web of intrigue and murder involving the most brilliant scientific minds in Regency London . . .
The plot of the book revolves around a “wonder drug” botanical medicine that will save countless lives. I started on it before the pandemic, but in a strange “Life imitates Art” twist, I wrote last half of the book during the height of the lockdown here in the U. S. Naturally, it made me think a lot about the terrors of getting sick, and how in our modern world, we’re so extraordinarily lucky that modern medicine can cure so many things that were fatal during the Regency.

Trouble and Romance in the Highlands

Susan here, delighted to introduce you to two of my dearest fictional friends—Sophie and Kate, MacCarran sisters who each get into a patch of trouble, run smack into unexpected adventure, and are surprised by love in the Highlands when Sophie meets a Highland outlaw and Kate encounters an officer of the Black Watch.

Stealing Sophie and Keeping Kate, my most recent ebook releases, are Books I and II in my “Highland Dreamers” series. These “author’s cut” editions were originally written as Sarah Gabriel—and I had fun giving each book a bit of a makeover and an update, editing, tightening, and adding some new material.

Right now they are a real steal--the ebooks are specially priced at .99 each for just a little while! It was a thrill recently when they climbed the historical romance and Highland romance lists at Amazon, where Sophie hit #1 and stuck for a while!

"A witty and charming book and a fun read, romantic and very Scottish!" said one Amazon reviewer of Stealing Sophie. "Beautifully written, with interesting characters and rich historical detail," wrote another reader. 

I absolutely love the gorgeous new covers designed by the talented Kim Killion of The Killion Group. What a treat to see how beautifully the covers represent the stories—Sophie, stubborn and proud, is not about to let anyone steal her away, especially a Highland rogue like Connor MacPherson, who is trying to fulfill a promise to her brother. And Kate, defiant and independent, faces off with Captain Alec Fraser, the Highland officer ordered to bring the beautiful Jacobite spy to justice.

Both stories are set in 18^th century Scotland at a time when pockets of rebellion held fast in Scotland as English troops made deeper inroads into the Highlands, imposing English laws and authority on resistant Highlanders. I wanted these stories and characters to reflect the stubbornness, pride, and conflicts of that time, while bringing romance and hope and a little touch of magic to the mix.

Did I mention that Sophie and Kate each have a natural gift inherited from a long-ago fairy ancestor? They are part of the MacCarran family tree, where magical abilities are passed from branch to branch. I visited that same tree in my Whisky Lairds series too, including Laird of Twilight and Laird of Secrets, both set in late Regency Scotland.

I hope you’ll look for the books to find out how these fairy gifts bring plenty of trouble and ultimately romance to my Highland MacCarrans!  (photo: a shot of misty Highland hills taken by my d-i-l.)

Here’s a sneak peek at Stealing Sophie and Keeping Kate  . . .

 

Mood Music

Christina here. Lots of authors seem to listen to music while they write in order to get in the right mood – sometimes the same song over and over again to inspire a particular scene they might be working on. Many of them have specific playlists for each book with one song per chapter, which they mention either on their blogs or at the start of their books so that readers can listen along with them. I can’t do that. I need silence in order to compose my thoughts and disappear into my own little world, and music would drag me out of it because when I listen to something I really like, I get lost in that instead.

That’s not to say I don’t find music inspiring. I do, but I like to listen to it before or after I write, not during the process. And I also love to watch music videos as some of them are mini stories in their own right and they can trigger plots or characters in my head. Today I thought I would share with you some of the songs, music and/or videos that I’ve found helpful while writing my Viking stories and the reasons why.

Eighteenth Century Party House

Nicola here. Back in the mid-18^th century there was only one fashionable place to be if you wanted a “villa” on the River Thames (a villa in these terms being something roughly the size of a large country house to the rest of us.) That place was Twickenham, a village half-way between the two royal palaces of Richmond and Hampton Court and with the improvements in both roads and carriages, a mere two hours’ drive from Central London. It was here in 1747 that Horace Walpole, the son of England’s first Prime Minister, bought a house that he referred to as a “plaything” and a “bauble” that was to be his summer residence, Strawberry Hill House. Even the name suggests hot summer days and fruit growing wild on the hillsides!

These days Twickenham is a busy suburb and it takes less than an hour to drive between the town and the centre of London. Gone are many of the imposing villas beside the Thames, although a few are still around, and the old houses are often surrounded by the new. Horace Walpole’s little Gothic Castle is still there, though, even if we didn’t see any wild strawberries growing on the hill during our visit.

August What We're Reading

Collected by Mary Jo

Christina Courtenay Contributes:

Following a Wench recommendation, I have spent this month immersed in the world of the Brooklyn Bruisers, a series by Sarina Bowen. Starting with Rookie Move, it follows the members of a new ice hockey team based in Brooklyn, each of whom falls in love in spectacular fashion. As a huge fan of ice hockey, I’ve really enjoyed this series and am now working my way through various spin-offs as well. I’ll probably also read all the other books by this author as soon as I can.

Rookie Move features Leo, a player who has spent the last six years trying to succeed in the NHL and also get over the girl who broke his heart in high school. Unfortunately for him, when he’s taken on by the Bruisers he finds that the team’s publicist is his former girlfriend Georgia, and the coach is her father, who hates him with a vengeance. As for Georgia, she had suffered her own trauma and the last thing she wants is to work with Leo. Keeping their relationship strictly professional is never going to be easy …

 

A winner

Anne here, with a quick Sunday post to announce a winner in the draw arising from the interview Mary Jo did with me.

Jeanne B has won a copy of The Scoundrel's Daughter.

Congratulations, Jeanne. I will email you directly.

Thank you to all who left comments, flowers, good wishes and compliments. The wenchly community is wonderful.

Here's a sprig of fragrant lilac from the old tree in my garden. I wish you could smell it.

Dark Passage

Dark Passage:

The Lackland Abbey Chronicles: The Second Adventure

by Mary Jo

While I've always written romance focused on one couple, but with connecting characters around them, this young adult series is different because it's about a small group of young people moving together through their world. 

The heart and soul of the stories, is Tory--sixteen year old Lady Victoria Mansfield.  In Book 1, Dark Mirror, she was exiled to Lackland Abbey to be "cured" of her magic. There she makes friends both at the Abbey and in WWII England, where all the young mages worked together to help save their country.

After surviving the terrors of time travel and of the Dunkirk evacuation, Tory and her friends are grateful to be back home in their own time, and none of them want to ever again make the shattering trip through Merlin's Mirror to the twentieth century again.