Word Wenches

The Windows of the Soul

  “The eyes, like sentinels, occupy the highest place in the body.”

   “The face is a picture of the mind with the eyes as its interpreter.”

   “The countenance is the portrait of the soul, and the eyes mark its intentions.’  Marcus Tullius Cicero

Christina here – the Roman Cicero seems to have had a lot to say about eyes, but I totally agree with him about their importance – they are “the windows of the soul” as someone said, no matter what colour they are. And we might not always notice other people’s eyes in real life, but when it comes to fictional characters, they are crucial, at least for me, especially when describing a hero. Eyes can be shifty, evasive, not looking straight at you when you’re talking to their owner. That’s not good. A hero has to have an honest, direct gaze, and just looking him in the eyes must make the heroine (and thereby also the reader) feel they can trust him and that he's telling the truth.

   “The tongue may hide the truth but the eyes – never!” Mikhail Bulgakov

What We're Reading — July 2020

Anne here, hosting this month's WWR (What We're Reading) post for July.
We start with Pat, who's talking about NEVERWHERE, by Neil Gaiman.

The version I read was the “author’s preferred version.” The book started out as a television script and has gone through several editions since. This most recent one is Gaiman at his most charmingly insane. Richard, an up-and-coming investment analyst with am ambitious fiancée, uncharacteristically rescues an injured waif who falls at his feet. From that moment on, he’s drawn deeper into a world of fantasy beneath London’s streets, into the sewers and underground, becoming invisible—like the homeless—to the kind of people he once was. As in any fantasy, Richard has lessons to learn as he fights to return to his own home but ends up fighting for others instead. I really needed this escapism and it’s so well written that I never yawned and flipped pages. That’s true world building!  

Christina said, I have had a few disappointing reads this month, so I won’t mention those – suffice it to say that I really hate when a book or a series doesn’t end the way I want it to! The only book I’ve really enjoyed is Summer Island by Natalie Normann. Natalie is a Norwegian author who has written over 50 novels in her own language, but his is her first one in English and it’s wonderful! It’s one of those books that draws you in right from the start and then you just can’t stop reading. In fact, I finished it in one sitting and absolutely loved both the characters, story and setting. I now want to spend summer on an idyllic Norwegian island, swimming in the sea, rowing, eating the local food and relaxing. I could totally understand how the hero (who is English) got sucked into the little community on the island and never wanted to leave again – I didn’t either. The heroine is refreshingly direct and I adored her sidekick – a Norwegian buhund called Frikk! (Dog characters are always a bonus for me.) There is a sequel on the way set at Christmas and I can’t wait to read it!

Names and Saints' Days

Saint Christina by Carlo Dolci - Art UK, Wikimedia Commons

Christina here – This week I will be celebrating my name day – a Swedish tradition that baffles a lot of my English friends, although I know other countries, like Spain, share this custom (there it’s called día de santo). It’s probably not as common in Sweden nowadays, but in my family we keep it up, mainly because it’s a great excuse for cake (if you need an excuse! - see my previous post here) and also because several of us share the same name so it gives us a special bond.

Friday (24^th July) is St Christina’s day and although Sweden is mainly a Protestant country, for some reason they have retained the various saints’ days in their calendar. To make it more modern and inclusive, as names vary a lot more now than in the past, they have recently added lots of new names (not belonging to any saint as far as I know). That means I officially have two name days, with a new one for my other name Pia, but I’ve always celebrated Christina and one is enough for me.

Inspirational Grandeur

Christina here. Have you ever fallen completely and utterly in love … with a house? I have to admit I do this quite frequently. I love old houses, and usually the ones that appeal to me the most are grand aristocratic mansions, but more modest buildings that are quirky in some way also fascinate me. Whatever the type of building, me falling in love with it often leads to inspiration for a story, which is great and just what an author needs. My current “crush” is Tyntesfield, a Victorian Gothic Revival mansion near Bristol here in the UK. It’s a truly spectacular place and absolutely perfect as the setting for a timeslip novel!

I’ve had a thing about Gothic architecture ever since the first time I saw a building in that style, and although I have no idea why, it appeals to me like nothing else. Maybe it’s the over-the-top decorations, carvings and gargoyles, or the pointy window and door arches? Or just the sheer extravagance and exuberance that seems to have gone into creating these buildings. Whatever it is, I want one! And I don’t just want a tiny cottage in the Gothic style, I dream of a huge stately home like Tyntesfield, complete with landscaped grounds and a walled garden. Obviously I can’t have one, as I’m not a billionaire, so I make do with the next best thing – using it as the basis for an imaginary house in one of my stories. And since my heroine will be living there, so will I, vicariously.

What We're Reading in June

The Word Wenches have been reading the most lovely books.

Mary Jo's recommendations for this month include one of my own old favorites.

Mary Jo:

I've read some new books this last month, but the only stories that really grabbed me were two oldies.  The first was Mary Stewart's The Ivy Tree.  We've discussed Mary Stewart here before--the Wenches are major fans and she shaped the writing for several of us, me included.

The Ivy Tree was the first Mary Stewart I ever read, in a condensed version in my mother's Ladies Home Journal.  I was riveted, and the big story twist was like being clubbed. (I'm harder to surprise now, but it's still one heck of a twist. <G>) 

Stewart is marvelous in her descriptions of story settings, and she makes a Northumberland summer come alive with sensual warmth.  Good suspense and romance, too.  (A lot of smoking goes on, as in most of Stewart's books, a sign of the changing times.)  It's still a wonderful story. 

My other favorite book is Sarah-Kate Lynch's The Wedding Bees, which I learned about on an earlier WWR.  I think it was recommended by Anne Gracie and Pat Rice.  I was a little wary, not being over fond of stinging insects, but within a couple of chapters, I was hooked.  It's kind of magical realism with the heroine, Sugar Wallace, exiled from her beloved Southern home and each year moving herself and her bees to a new city chosen by her queen bee, one of a succession of Elizabeths.  (The current queen is Elizabeth the 6th.)

This time she's led to New York City in an apartment with a great views, a terrace for her bees, and a half dozen other units in the building occupied by miserable people.  Sugar is a healer with both her honey and her warmth, and by the end of the book, everyone in the building is happy, and they and her bees have healed her into happiness and love. A delightful story.

 

Susan brings us a most interesting mystery series and a rather famous book about writing itself.

 

Susan:  This round, I read something new to me and something much-read (I won't mention the stack of to-be-reads, half-reads, meant-to-finishes, and forgot-I-hads that I didn't get through!). I'm leisurely making my way through Elly Griffiths' Ruth Galloway mystery series, picking one up now and then, and Dying Fall was a very good point in the series, about halfway through so far. Archaeologist and forensic bone specialist Dr. Ruth Galloway--single mom to a toddler she shares with Nelson, a local detective chief inspector--is drawn into a major archaeological discovery by an old friend who is soon murdered.

Time for Cake!

Christina here. A friend of mine has her birthday today – happy birthday! – so naturally my thoughts turned to cake! Well, the two usually go together, don’t they? Birthdays are a great excuse for baking (and eating) cake and it wouldn’t be a special day without such a culinary treat, at least not to me. Cake can also cheer us up in these uncertain times, so why not indulge ourselves a litte? It made me wonder though – who first hit on the idea of making cake? Time to dive down a research rabbit hole …

Attribution https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=128566

I don’t think anyone really knows where cake baking originated, but the first ones were probably more like bread sweetened with honey. Rather than putting the honey on top of the bread, someone decided to put it inside before baking and liked the result. I’m all for that as I confess I don’t like the taste of honey on its own. Nuts and fruit could have been added to make it sweeter (sugar came much later) as that was all they had. We know the Egyptians made special cakes for various feasts, religious ceremonies or for people to take with them to the afterlife. And then the Romans started adding eggs and butter to their bread dough, as well as honey, which gave them a cake like result. They must have brought these recipes to England when they were in control here, but then they left and the Dark Ages came … well, without cake they must have been dark indeed!

Ask-A-Wench: What was your first job?

Anne here, and today on "ask a wench" we're responding to the question, 'What was your first ever job?'

Pat begins:  Oh dear, I’m not entirely certain where to start. With babysitting? Boring. How about the candy store I set up in the local park?

That was fun but a lot of work. A friend and I had to take a cooler on the bus downtown (we were only fourteen—and our mothers didn’t have cars) to the candy wholesaler. We’d load up on everything we liked, then hauled it back to the neighborhood and sold it out of a little park building no one was using. We made enough that summer to outfit ourselves quite nicely when school started in the fall!

But I suppose my real live out-in-the-world job was a cashier at Value Village, a place I could walk to. I doubt anyone remembers them, a precursor to K-Mart. I was only fifteen (my birthday was a few months away) and not exactly legal, but the store had just opened. They were desperate to fill positions and didn’t ask questions. The entire neighborhood was thrilled to have this exciting new store (oh, those were the days!) and the lines curled to the back of the building for weeks after it opened. I swear I memorized every code in the store because the stock moved too quickly to be marked. Can you remember ever being excited by the opening of a cheap discount store?!

Of course, the best part of that job—besides the paycheck—was that all the guys went there to buy parts and oil for their cars. My IT Guy was one of them. <G>

Christina says:  My first proper job was a summer job working in an office. At the time, I’d been at university in Sweden for a year and I wanted to earn some extra money. Students never have enough, do they! My father worked for a Swedish company with branches all over the world and he managed to secure me a six-week stint in their London office, because he knew the manager. I was very excited to be spending so much time in the UK, staying with my aunt and uncle – that felt like a vacation in itself – although I was a bit apprehensive about the work as I had no idea what it entailed. And when I turned up on the appointed day, I think the manager had forgotten to tell his staff I was coming as everyone was a bit taken aback and no one knew what to do with me!

A Journey Back in Time

Christina here. I should have been in Norway right now on a research holiday, but for obvious reasons I’ve had to postpone. It’s a shame, as I was really looking forward to exploring that country, but hopefully I will get there next year. I had planned to tell you all about my journey too – hopefully with lots of wonderful photos – but I will have to take you along on last year’s trip to Denmark instead. As we’re all stuck at home, I hope you’ll enjoy a little bit of armchair travel!

For an author, seeing or experiencing things first hand is always the best way of doing research, and it’s a great excuse for going places. Of course it’s not always possible to find exactly what you need, especially when like me you’re writing about Viking times, but there are ways and means. With the whole of Scandinavia steeped in Viking history, one can definitely get a feel for the setting as a whole. And fortunately there are also quite a few museums where the curators have tried to recreate the past to really give visitors a taste of what it was like a thousand years ago. Two of the best ones are in Denmark and I came up with the idea of taking my mother (who lives in Sweden) on a little road trip, thereby killing two birds with one stone – she would get a mini holiday and I’d get to do some vital research while spending quality time with her!

What We're Reading in May

Pat here with May’s collection of favorite reads. Some of us are apparently hunkered down in this enforced isolation and have read entire libraries. And then there’s Jo Bourne:

Jo B:

What people think Romance Writers read: Love's Inventive Gymnastics.

What Romance Writers Actually Read: Essays in Social History, Volume I: The Preindustrial Millennia and The ZTE Cell Phone User's Guide.

We read this stuff because we are nerds and cannot safely be turned loose in a library. Preindustrial Millenia is an interesting look at the economics of Greek and Roman slavery versus peasantry. I come away renewed in my determination to avoid being the bottom rung of the social ladder in the Classical period.

Another ladder I would probably avoid any rung of is Revolutionary France, but it's still a joy to pick up Daily Life in the French Revolution by Jean Robiquet, which is full of pithy wisdom and quotes from original material. I am a sucker for "Daily Life in ..." books altogether. Just skip the politics and battlefields and tell me how they got the clothes washed. I'd recommend picking up Robiquet second hand since it hasn't been put in ebook or even paperback.

Word Wench Anniversary Ball

Compiled by Mary Jo

This year, we're holding a ball!  Each Wench will bring one of her favorite heroes. (Not the favorite, because how can one choose just one from among so many fabulous men?  <G>)  

I'm wearing the burgundy velvet gown I was married in, but I'm not the star of this occasion!  That would be Lord Ross Carlisle, hero of one of my earlier books, Silk and Secrets, second in my Silk Trilogy.  Though by nature he's rather reserved and scholarly, he's also deeply interested in all kinds of people and distant places.  Which is why he became one of those amazingly intrepid early Victorian explorers who crossed mountains and deserts and dared all kinds of dangers to explore the mysteries of the unknown. 

Ross was on his last expedition to Central Asia when he discovered his beloved, long estranged wife Juliet Cameron.  Together they risk the lethal journey to Bokhara in hopes of rescuing her brother--and in the process they discover each other again.  Ross and Juliet are generally inseparable, but she's starting the evening by joining a group of other wives in the library where they can sip brandy and claret and catch up on each other's news. 

I've now published Silk and Secrets as an e-book and later this year there will be an audio edition narrated by Siobhan Waring.  I chose this illustration from the NAL first edition because it's one of my all time favorite covers  and Ross and Juliet both look so gorgeous,  They are also dancing, though not anything you'd see in an English ballroom!  Ross, endlessly interested in all kinds of people, is looking forward to meeting the tribe of Wenches and our companions!

 

 

All Things Japanese

Christina here and for today’s post I’m going Japanese! As you may have seen from Anne’s introduction of me (here), I was lucky enough to live in Japan for several years and I fell in love with everything about that country, including its beautiful traditional garments. So when the Victoria & Albert Museum in London put on an exhibition of kimono earlier this year, I just had to go and see it! It was glorious and as we’re now all stuck at home, I thought I’d give you a little taste of what was on display and tell you about these very special robes which featured in one of my very first novels, The Scarlet Kimono.

Welcome to the New Wench

Anne here, and today I'm delighted to introduce you to our newest wench — Christina Courtenay.

Christina is an award-winning, bestselling author of sweeping historical romances, regencies, time slip/time travel novels, and young adult novels, among others. She has won several awards, twice winning the RoNA for Best Historical Romantic Novel with Highland Storms (2012) and The Gilded Fan (2014), and won the Big Red Reads Historical Fiction Award with The Scarlet Kimono.

She also chaired the RNA (Romantic Novelists Association) in the UK from 2013-2015. (Read an interview here.) Naturally she is friends with wench Nicola, but she's also very good friends with our departing wench, Susanna. Here's a photo of the two of them together at an RNA event some years ago.

I first came across Christina's books five years ago, when Nicola mentioned one of her books, saying that it was set partly in Asia, something that always interests me. I bought Trade Winds, read it, and immediately glommed the rest of her backlist. I loved her big sweeping stories where Scottish and Swedish people found love and adventure in Japan and other parts of Asia.

Christina: Thank you Anne, so glad you enjoyed them, and I’m hugely honoured to have been asked to join the Word Wenches! I have been a fan ever since Susanna first told me to seek out this blog many years ago (thank you, Susanna, great advice!) so to actually be a part of it is just amazing.

Anne: Christina, you had something of an adventurous youth yourself; born in England, raised in Sweden and then, when you were sixteen, your family moved to Japan. What was that like?