Celebrate! Our Word Wenches blog is NINE years old this week!
In blog years, that’s … well, since May 22, 2006, we’ve written nearly 1500 blogs, if you do a little math (and we prefer to do only a little math). Consider us wise and Wenchly after all those years and blogs, and very pleased to still be blogging strong. We’re especially pleased and very grateful that you, our blog readers and friends, have been so loyal and such fun over the years!
We’re celebrating with virtual cake and candles, balloons and prezzies – in the form of a great giveaway contest that you can all enter (see details below)! We’re also celebrating with a look back at our very first books – the book that started it all for each of us, taking us by different paths to the Land of Word Wenches, where we indulged our mutual love of history and historical fiction—and found that one of the secrets to a long-lived blog is friendship (along with the ability to go with the flow and be real chill about details, and we’re all pretty good at that)!
Here’s a look at the first books we ever wrote – Part One.
Look for Part Two of our Anniversary Celebration on Friday!
Patricia Rice
The book that set me on the path to Wenchland was originally called Love’s First Surrender, published by Kensington in 1984. I had just graduated with an accounting degree, was living in a small town that wasn’t fond of the idea of female accountants, and for the first time since I was fourteen, I wasn’t working or going to school or both. I had time to watch my toddler race around the driveway on his Big Wheel, but I was bored out of my skull. I like working. I couldn’t afford to buy books, so I wrote my own. I wrote several, actually, but Surrender is the one I deliberately tried to write to fit the sexy historical romance market of the time. I’d never had a writing class, didn’t know RWA existed, had no notion of how to get published except from Writer’s Digest. But I figured I had to do something to make money if I couldn’t find a job, so I dedicated toddler nap times to writing a sexy historical in long hand in a Walmart notebook. Once I had a complete draft, I bought a used Underwood typewriter and typed it all up. Those were the days of carbon copies, white-out, and boxing 500 pages to ship via snail mail with SASEs inside. I quickly learned to just send the first fifty pages!
And lo and behold, I got The Call the same week I was hired by two Baptist deacons as an accountant. Sometimes, we get what we wish for—and it only makes life more complicated!
Cara Elliott/Andrea Pickens
Needless to say, I was now in Seventh Heaven. Having loved storytelling ever since I was a child (my mother saved a number of lavishly illustrated cowboy “books” that I wrote when I was five) I suppose it was only natural that I soon got the urge to try my hand at a Regency story. One weekend, I got out my pencil and notebook and started to scribble . . .
The road rose up to greet me with few more lucky turns. An agent who was the friend of a friend agreed to meet with me to hear a pitch on a contemporary thriller idea I had. He listened patiently, making polite noises, and when we rose to shake hands, I don’t know what made me add, “Oh, and I know you won’t be at all interested in this, but I also have a finished Regency romance.” At that, his eyes lit up. He said one of his good friends was the head of the Signet line, and asked if I would send it to him. Three days later he called to tell me he had sold The Defiant Governess . . . and, well, here I am! (What is incredibly fun for me is to see it have new life—having gotten the rights back, I’ve released it as an e-book (written as Andrea Pickens) and the fact that readers still seem to enjoy the story is very heartening.)
Nicola Cornick
Nicola is away this week, but we know she would want to join the party! So we want to mention that Nicola’s first book was True Colours, published by Mills & Boon in 1998. You can find out more about it on Nicola’s website. When she returns, perhaps she’ll find a moment to tell us more about her first book and her road to Wenches!
Susan King
My first novel was born of my dissertation in medieval art and a pregnancy complication that put me on bedrest for months, bored out of my mind, on hiatus from graduate studies, and reading anything I could get my hands on. A friend brought me an assortment of used paperback historical romances, a genre I hadn’t read before. Among that stack of books was a tattered copy of Woodiwiss’ The Wolf and the Dove. It was medieval, it was lush, romantic, fresh and exciting – and a needed change from hefty history tomes. I began reading widely (and sort of rabidly) along the timeline of historical romance, absorbing everything. I had always loved fiction—and secretly wanted to write stories, but didn’t think it practical (so I was studying, uh, art). The baby showed up, I returned to grad school, more babies showed up, and more bedrest and more reading. By the time I had three cute little guys running around and a dissertation nearly finished, I wanted to give fiction one good try before moving on.
With what little time I had, I flipped my dissertation—medieval England and manuscript illumination and a fascination with Robin Hood tales—tossed it in the story soup and stirred. The result was The Black Thorne’s Rose. Somehow I entered a contest, somehow I won, and met an agent who encouraged me to finish the book. Within a month of submitting the manuscript, I had a two-book contract with Penguin. That first book was uniquely exciting and fun to write, and by following that writing road, I’ve found many friends, including the Wenches. Nine years ago, a few of us thought a blog would be fun – and here we are!
Anniversary Giveaway!
We’re offering NINE great prizes in honor of our ninth anniversary – enter below for a chance to win!
Grand Prize: A bundle of eight Wench books will go to one lucky winner!
Eight Prizes: Eight winners will win one book each!
You can also enter via our Word Wenches Facebook page. Winners will be chosen at random. You can leave a comment on the blog to be entered as well.