Word Wenches

Punches and Pugilists—Random Fcts on Regency Boxing

Andrea here, offering yet another down-the-rabbit-hole research discovery today. I love research, as part of the fun is discovering things you didn’t know you wanted to know! Now, I am not a bellicose person, so I’m not at all interested in an actual boxing match. But as I needed to know a few specifics about ‘pugilism’ for a WIP scene, I had to research a few basic things.

And voila! Down the rabbit hole! Now, in the spirit of full disclosure, I find the history of just about anything fascinating on an intellectual level, and as I happen to like sports (the other Wenches have dubbed me the ‘Wench Jock’) I actually found myself very interested in the resources I found. One of the most intriguing is “Fighting Words," an online exhibit from the Hesburgh Libraries at the University of Notre Dame, from which I have cheerful poached some of the following information.

Victorian Opulence at Osborne House!

Nicola here. A couple of weeks ago I spent a few days on the Isle of Wight in a cottage that is situated on the Osborne House estate. Although I knew that Queen Victoria had built Osborne as a summer holiday home (more on that later!) I knew very little about it or its history so it was a fascinating trip. When I say that we stayed in a cottage, it was actually the gatehouse to the estate, known as Sovereign’s Gate, which was the entrance through which Queen Victoria and her family would have approached the house back in the day. Now transformed into a holiday home over three levels, it’s a fabulous place to stay. These days the Sovereign’s Gate is locked but Angus was happy to pose for a photo to show it off! Inside the gatehouse has many of its original 19th century features, including these fabulous windows with movable sashes on a pulley system.

As the house and grounds were closed, we had the place largely to ourselves. This was an enormous privilege enabling us to explore
the acres of gardens, park and beach (as long as we told the security detail that we were going out - it was rather like having bodyguards!). It also meant that I got a personalised tour of Osborne House itself, which was brilliant. I was allowed to use the  “ministers’ door”; there were five different entrances at Osborne, one reserved for the monarch only, the second for the royal family, the third for ministers, the fourth for titled visitors and members of the court and the one round the back for the servants and tradesmen!

Hokusai and Japanese Woodblock Prints

Christina here. Ever since I lived in Japan, I’ve been drawn to Japanese woodblock prints. They are both simple and beautiful, and the variety of subjects is endless. Mostly they depict nature and/or people and places, and one of the absolute masters of this art was Katsushika Hokusai (1760-1849). I think most people are familiar with his most famous print known as The Great Wave, which was actually entitled Under the Wave off Kanagawa. I love how he managed to create such wonderful scenes with just a few brushstrokes and his prints really show the Japanese way of life as it was back then.

He is mostly known for his landscape prints and paintings, but he was also the most amazing illustrator for various types of books. Recently, I was fortunate enough to attend an exhibition at the British Museum in London of some of his preliminary sketches and drawings for one such, a sort of picture encyclopedia that was going to be called The Great Picture Book of Everything. It was extremely interesting to see how he’d gone about creating the prints and where he got his ideas from. Most of the drawings were quite tiny and a little dark, but all were exquisite and showed his sense of humour and incredible imagination.

A Book at Bedtime

Nicola here, talking today about listening to stories, not as audio books but as serializations. On 31^st January 1949 the first edition of BBC Radio’s "Book at Bedtime" was broadcast. It ran every night for 15 minutes between 10.45pm and 11pm. The first book that was serialized was John Buchan’s The Three Hostages, a rip-roaring adventure story written in 1924. In the months and years that followed, all sorts of literature from the classics to new releases has and continues to be featured on the program, although perhaps there hasn't been as much genre fiction as there might have been. In fact only a year or so ago the BBC admitted that they were looking for happier endings after noticing that listeners had been put off by “gratuitously violent and tragic stories.” Well, yeah – I don’t know about you but I wouldn’t want to drift off to sleep with images of violence or misery into my mind! 

According to The Times, a brief circulated to potential producers at the time stated: “We will always aim to select a variety but we would like to be offered more titles that are pure pleasure, diversion or even comedy. Happy endings are often a bit too rare in what we are asked to consider. We can listen to sad or disturbing stories if they are ultimately redemptive, but a gratuitously violent or tragic ending is upsetting, infuriating and can seem distasteful.” The note adds that “listeners rarely enjoy being cheated with ambiguity or uncertainty”, implying a preference for plotlines that are neatly resolved. Again, that's a yes from me; I don't mind stories where some elements are left unresolved for the reader or listener to decide on, but if that happened just before I was going to sleep I'd lie awake thinking about it!

The Art of Letterlocking

Andrea here, musing today about privacy and our personal correspondences. I think that most of us would prefer that our words are only read by the person or persons for whom they are intended. Thus we’re paying more attention to having passwords and two-step notifications set up to keep “snoopers” away from our e-mails.

But the wish for privacy is nothing new when it comes to personal correspondences. Apparently historical figures like Queen Elizabeth I, Mary, Queen of Scots, Galileo, Marie Antoinette, and Albrecht Dürer, just to name a few, were equally worried about people snooping through their mail! Recently, I happened to come across a fascinating article in the New York Times about historical “letterlocking” in Western Europe and thought I would share some of what I learned on the subject.

A Little Bit of Switzerland in Regency England!

Nicola here. When I was a student in London, I lived near the Finchley Road. This was one of the main roads that led North out of the centre of London and it was often very busy with traffic. At one large roundabout there was a sight that always struck me as very odd: A Swiss chalet in the middle of the road. It was a pub and it was called, perhaps unsurprisingly, “Swiss Cottage.” The roundabout and the nearby underground station were named after it, and for such a busy and modern place it looked total incongruous.

I didn’t realise then that when the original “Swiss Tavern” was built there in 1804, it was part of a
larger fashion for recreating Swiss landscapes in England and elsewhere as part of the Romantic movement. Yes, as is often the case, the poet William Wordsworth had a hand in bringing back the idea of “Swissness” as something that represented freedom and beautiful scenery. In 1790 he and a friend took a walking tour of Switzerland and he was awestruck by the landscape and also by a scale model he saw of Lake Lucerne, the mountains and the alpine cottages. He brought home the idea of creating little Switzerlands in the English countryside.

Reasons to Like January

Nicola here. Sometimes I’ve been inclined to think of January as a long, dark, cold month without a lot going for it, but I was talking to a friend the other day and she saw the month in quite a different light.  “I love January,” she said. “I don’t spend much money and I get myself organised for the months ahead.” So as we approach Twelfth Night and the end of the traditional Christmastide, I thought I would muse on all the reasons there are to like January.

According to my Chambers Book of Days, the gemstone for January is the garnet and the birth flower is either the snowdrop or the carnation. At Ashdown Woods the first green shoots of the wild snowdrops are already pushing through the ground. By the end of the month they will be starting to flower. The snowdrop’s Latin name is Galanthus, from the Greek for “milk flower”. In French the snowdrop is known as the “perce-neige” because it pierces the snow, and the Germans call it Schneeglöckchen, little snowbell, which are all such pretty names suiting its delicate beauty. It’s real reminder of spring on the way.

This brings me to the weather. You may know the saying: “There’s no bad weather only bad clothing choices.” In my part of Northern Hemisphere it’s a time for scarves, gloves and hats and also waterproof layers. The rain may feel cold and raw but it’s also refreshing. And I love the sound the wind makes blowing through the bare branches of the trees. Darkness still arrives during the afternoon but the light lasts a little longer each day. My morning and evening walks give stormy skies and great views of the weather blowing across the Vale of the White Horse.

An old Celtic name for January was “the dead month” whilst the Anglo Saxons called it “Wolfmonath” which does send a shiver down the spine. It’s easy to see how January got its bad reputation. But there is so much pleasure in returning from a cold walk to a hot cup of tea, sitting down with a book whilst darkness falls outside, and enjoying the sense of new beginnings whether they are eagerly-anticipated TV shows or films, or a new course to join or a new interest to pursue.

What do you like – or even love - about January?

The Songbirds of Winter

Nicola here. It’s December 28^th and day four of the twelve days of Christmas. These days when I wake up in the mornings it’s usually still dark so I doze for a bit before getting up to make the morning tea and let the dogs out. One of the first sounds I often hear, as dawn is breaking, is birdsong.

In the well-known song, on the fourth day of Christmas, my true loves gives to me “four calling birds” as well as the three French hens, two turtle doves and the partridge in the pear tree. Originally, however the words were “four colly birds,” which in 1780 when the song was written meant four blackbirds. These were the European blackbirds that are the colour of coal dust. The words were changed to “calling birds” in some versions at the start of the 20^th century as so many people didn’t know that “colly bird” was a northern dialect word for a black bird.

In another old nursery rhyme four and twenty blackbirds are baked in a pie and “when the pie was opened the birds began to sing”. This isn’t quite as bad as it sounds (although bad enough); in medieval cuisine, the live birds were only put under the pie crust at the last minute to give everyone a surprise when it was served. It certainly would have given you a surprise, I imagine, to find what the blackbirds might have deposited in your pie! (The picture of the blackbird is by Cornelius Nozeman from the collections of the Koninklijke Bibliotheek, part of which is available on Wikimedia Commons.)

This brings me back to waking up in the early morning hearing birdsong. I had thought it was a blackbird in the garden but it turns out that they don’t start singing until the end of January when the male blackbirds start to claim their territories. No, it is the bright and beautiful little European Robin that is perched on our weeping pear tree, singing away as the dawn breaks. Happy Fourth Day of Christmas!

What do you wake up to in the mornings?  Music, a news programme, an alarm, birdsong or like me a nice up of tea? If you would like to listen to the dawn chorus there is a link here.

Dressing For Christmas!

Nicola here. Every year as Christmas approaches, I try to visit one of my favourite stately homes to see it “dressed” for Christmas. This is an official term, apparently, and involves a lot of decorating which puts my own Christmas tree and lights to shame! (For a start, I don't have four model trumpeters outside my house to welcome visitors!) It hasn’t been possible to keep this visiting tradition going during the pandemic, so this year it was a real treat to be able to go to Beaulieu in the New Forest and enjoy some spectacular decorations that totally put me in the Christmas mood.

Beaulieu is probably best known for its famous Motor Museum and whilst I did pop in to have a look at an Aston Martin or two (there was a James Bond exhibition on) my main interest was in the ruins of the abbey and Beaulieu Palace itself.

There isn’t much left of the abbey, once the largest Cistercian building in England. The ruins are rather atmospheric though. Like so many other monastic buildings, the abbey’s downfall came in 1538 with Henry VIII’s dissolution of the monasteries when it was sold into private hands and much of the stone was taken away and used for other building projects. It’s still possible to see the scale of the whole estate and imagine it surrounded by a 12 foot high wall that stretched for a mile, with the great gatehouse (which still stands) and the river and quay where boats would unload their supplies.

Travels in Italy--Part Three

Pat here:

As many do, I fell in love with Umbria and Tuscany, the hill country of Italy. It’s hard to define why this area is so special. Perhaps because I’m not a fan of cities and the rural countryside with rolling hills and olive orchards appeal to my introvert self. But I think it’s also a matter of seeing the layers of Italy’s ancient history, largely untouched in some areas, that made it come alive for me.

Tempted by the Runes

Christina here. In just a few days, my new Viking time travel story TEMPTED BY THE RUNES will be published and it’s based on the first Viking settlement of Iceland in the 860s/870s AD.

The Viking era is usually said to be roughly from 793 AD to 1066 AD, ie from the first Viking raid on the monastery at Lindisfarne to the Battle of Stamford Bridge when the last Viking king, Harald Hardraada, lost his bid for the English throne. When I first started writing this series, I knew I couldn’t cover all that time and I had to decide which parts to base my stories on. So I made a chart of all the events that were known to have happened from 750 AD onwards, and discovered that the years between 850 and 900 AD were jam-packed with possibilities. At that time, the Swedes were heading east and south down the Russian rivers, the Danes (and others) were raiding and conquering in Britain and Europe, the Norwegians established a kingdom in Ireland and started settling on Iceland, and there were internal power struggles in Scandinavia too. This gave me a rich historical tapestry from which to choose events that my characters could be part of.

The Last Daughter of York

Nicola here. Yesterday was NA release day for my latest dual-time historical mystery The Last Daughter of York which was published in the UK a few months ago under the title of The Last Daughter. Central to the story is the 15^th century mystery of the Princes in the Tower – what happened to these young sons of King Edward IV, was their uncle Richard responsible for their disappearance and possible death, and why is this mystery still so powerful today, 500 years later. I’m a real sucker for a historical mystery, real or imaginary, and I love the idea of examining the historical story in the present and coming up with a solution to an age-old mystery.

There is a theme of disappearance in both sections of the book. In the modern-day story, Serena Warren returns to Minster Lovell, the place of her childhood holidays, to try and find out what happened to her sister Caitlin who vanished ten years before. As Serena starts to dig into the past and her memories, she uncovers a genealogical link to the Plantagenets and the mystery of the princes.

Regency Theatre Clubs and Secret Societies

Nicola here. There’s a new series of one of my favourite TV programmes on at the moment, the BBC genealogy show Who Do You Think You Are. From connections to royalty to Dame Judi Dench’s links to Hamlet, there’s always something fascinating in people’s family history. Last week part of the programme focussed on one of the largest fraternal organisations in the UK, The Royal Antediluvian Order of Buffaloes. I must admit I don’t tend to think of the UK as being big into fraternal organisations other than the Masons and the “Buffs” as they are known, was new to me. However their origins and history turned out to be really interesting and got me thinking about the popularity of groups like these, why secret societies were so popular, and their decline in the modern day.

The Royal Antediluvian Order of Buffaloes was founded in 1822 during the reign of George IV. It sprang out of the theatre trade and was set up in the Harp Tavern in Covent Garden which stood opposite Drury Lane Theatre. Covent Garden was and still is the heart of London theatre land and The Harp, which has been demolished since, was a favourite drinking place for theatre people. Edmund Kean, the actor, was a famous habitué in the Regency period and Sheridan, the actor and playwright, hung out there in the earlier part of the Georgian era.

The Magic of Standing Stones

Christina here. There are certain places that feel timeless and really evoke the past, and stone circles, standing stones and cairns always have that effect on me. What is it about them that draws us in and has fascinated people for so long? Perhaps it’s the sheer mystery of the how and why? Because we can’t be sure exactly what they were used for, they make our imagination run riot. It’s easy to picture ceremonies honouring the sun, moon or stars, perhaps featuring druids in flowing white robes, chanting and dancing. Who knows if that ever actually happened, but it’s a nice fantasy.

In the past couple of weeks, I’ve been lucky enough to come across two places featuring such ancient monuments, and each time I found myself spellbound. They have a certain aura and just being among them gives us a feeling of awe and of stepping back in time. Most such monuments were built thousands of years ago, but they are so well constructed they’ve survived and stood the test of time. It’s mind-boggling when you consider the enormous amounts of work and manpower that must have been required, and the primitive tools in use back then. I never tire of watching programmes with theories as to how it was accomplished.

Once a Laird

Anne here, and today I'm interviewing Mary Jo about ONCE A LAIRD, her final book in the "Rogues Redeemed" series, which was based around five men held captive in a cellar in wartime, facing execution as spies in the morning. Of course they escaped and lived to tell some wonderful tales.  (Ramsay was using the name Chantry at that time for various sneaky reasons.)

Once a Laird is about Ramsay, who made the biggest impression on me in Once a Scoundrel, where he was instrumental in freeing three ladies from a harem in Constantinople after they'd been taken hostage by Barbary pirates. I've been waiting for his story ever since.

There have been some lovely reviews of Once a Laird."  Here's one from Booklist:

"In the latest splendidly crafted addition to her Rogues Redeemed series, Putney (Once Dishonored, 2020) brilliantly utilizes all of the key elements her readers crave—engaging characters, an expertly evoked setting, an intriguingly different story line, even a quintessential cat—and the result is another exemplary-in-every-way romance.” – Booklist

 

Mirror, mirror on the wall ...

Christina here. I have always found mirrors fascinating and I’m sure that’s been true for most people ever since the first caveman/woman happened to catch sight of him- or herself in a still pond or lake somewhere. Therefore, a recent TV programme I watched (Raiders of the Lost Past with Janina Ramirez on BBC2) about amazing archaeological finds in the 9,000-year old city of Çatalhöyük in Turkey, caught my attention. The presenter held up a mirror that was 7000 years old! It wasn’t what we would call a mirror really, but a piece of obsidian – rounded on one side to fit nicely into the palm of your hand and polished flat on the other side to such a shine that you could see your face in it. I was astonished to think such a thing existed so long ago!

Janina Ramirez ©BBC Television

It made me start thinking about mirrors in the past and of course I went down a rabbit hole …

Clearly, still water must have been the first type of mirror, and if no ponds, lakes or puddles were available, some water in a dark bowl or vessel could have been used. But that’s not very practical if you want to see yourself from any direction other than leaning above the surface. Apart from polished obsidian, apparently volcanic glass was also used in pre-historical times, then came polished copper, bronze and silver, and later steel. These are not very satisfactory though as the reflectivity is poor and these metals also tarnished quickly so had to be polished often.

Research from my bed

Anne here, and that's a slightly misleading heading — I'm not bedridden or about to talk about naughty things or anything, I just research from my bed, using my laptop, quite often. It could just as easily take place in my writing room on the main computer. But right now I'm writing this post from my bed, so . . . 

And I'm answering a question someone sent me privately, about doing research from the other side of the world.

I have huge envy of the wenches who can hop in a car and visit potential settings, or even those who can hop on a plane. I could hop on a plane, too, of course (though not currently with our CoVid restrictions), and have, often — the photo on the right is mine from my last UK trip. But a round trip to the UK costs me several thousand dollars, and believe me, sitting in a plane for 23 hours (one way) is no fun — and that's just to get there. In any case, with CoVid, travel is a whole other set of problems, not the least of which is the requirement to be quarantined for 10 days on arrival in the UK, and 2 weeks of quarantine on returning home.

Before I became a writer, I'd travelled quite a bit—in fact I was traveling in North America, the UK, Europe and Asia when I first decided to try to write for a living. And I'd visited the UK several times and lived in Scotland for a year as a child. 

But I was absorbing the sights and sounds and smells as a traveller, not a writer.  I toured museums and fabulous old houses for the love of history and fine old houses, not with a view to setting a scene in one of them, or having a character live in them. I wrote plenty of letters, but took no writerly notes.

So for me, most of the time, it has to be virtual research.

Island Stories

Nicola here. Since the time I first picked up a book I’ve been fascinated by islands, both in real life and as the setting for stories. Whether it's Five on a Treasure Island or The Island of Adventure by Enid Blyton, or Robinson Crusoe or Lord of the Flies (well not so much that one, perhaps) there is something magical about an island.

Islands offer the idea of escape and retreat and also the opportunity to start afresh. They are places set apart where you can take time and space to think. They appear solitary and pure in some ways, an earthly paradise. But they can also be too isolated, even savage, which is perhaps they make such great settings for crime novels. An island, if you can’t get off it easily, is the perfect “locked room” mystery as Agatha Christie proved and countless other crime and thriller authors have used the setting.

Travels in Italy--Part One

Wench Pat here, just back from a two-week trip to Italy, combining business with pleasure. I’ve dug up some fabulous ideas for the new mystery series and enough material for a year’s worth of blogs. I should probably just post photos and not blather on!

One of the lures for this trip was the opportunity to explore the Amalfi Coast and Pompeii. The winding, narrow coast drive is every bit as hair-raising as promised. We were a small group in a small bus and thankfully, most cars were smaller than us, but those giant buses. . . !  Ai yi yi. Traffic would back up on every curve when two buses met each other and had to maneuver their way out of the mess.

A Norwegian Adventure

Christina here and once again I’m going to take you all armchair travelling! A couple of weeks ago I was lucky enough to go to Norway on a research trip. My older daughter and I drove around the southern part of the country covering 1230 km in five days! Exhausting, but very rewarding.

We began our trip in the capital, Oslo, a beautiful town situated next to the Oslo fjord. In the city centre old houses mixed with new, overlooked by the royal castle up on a hill at one end of the famous Karl Johan Gate (street). Everything was within walking distance, including the cathedral, the harbour and Akershus, a medieval castle.

Farewell Blues

Farewell Blues: An Interview with Maggie Robinson

By Mary Jo

MJP: I'm delighted to welcome Maggie Robinson here today.  She started out in historical romance and is now writing historical mysteries.  She's here to discuss her recent release, Farewell Blues, fourth and last of her historical mystery Lady Adelaide series. 

Maggie, I've been enthralled by this series ever since you first told me the premise for book one, Nobody's Sweetheart Now.  Will you explain the setup of the series?  And tell us about the men in Addie's life!

MR:  I’m delighted to be here! Ah, the set up. It sounds…a little crazy. But I’m reminded of this description of The Wizard of Oz: “Transported to a surreal landscape, a young girl kills the first person she meets, then teams up with three strangers to kill again.”

Boiled down to its basics, there’s a widowed marquess’s daughter, the ghost of her philandering yet fatally charming husband, and a handsome Anglo-Indian detective. They team up not to kill but find killers through four light-hearted cozy mysteries.  (Nobody's Sweetheart Now, Whose Sorry Now, Just Make Believe, and Farewell Blues.)

Lady Johanna St.John's Recipe Book

Nicola here. A couple of weeks ago I took part in the UK’s Heritage Open Days Festival, the biggest celebration of history and heritage in the country. The theme of this year’s festival was Edible England and our display, put on by the Friends of Lydiard Park in Swindon, centred on a most fascinating historical document, a “recipe” book that was created by Lady Johanna St John in the 17^th century. Lady Johanna, as well as having many menus for sumptuous banquets, also used vegetable, flower, and herbal cures for everything from piles to nosebleeds. These are also included in her books and referred to as “recipes” so there is everything from a mutton stew to a cure for cramp! Some of the recipes are also for cosmetic treatments, such as to make your hands soft. We tried that one and the mixture worked beautifully as a hand cream; the only problem was that the cream – and us – smelled very strongly of vinegar! In fact a number of ingredients in some of the recipes would raise eyebrows now, including the use of cow dung!

As part of the festival, we invited Lucy Whitfield, women’s history specialist, to choose and recreate some of the recipes for visitors in the walled garden at Lydiard Park. The garden, which was created in the Georgian period and restored in 2007, is divided into six sections with wide pathways, a well and a sundial. The narrow beds contain trimmed shrubs and perennial plants, alternating with individual flowers and bulbs. Along the walls and in the centre of flowerbeds are trained apple, pear, greengage, peach, plum, cherry, apricot and fig trees. A part of the garden is dedicated to growing the types of herbs and other plants that Lady Johanna would have used in her recipes so it was the perfect setting to showcase some of the ingredients from the book. (I took lots of pictures which I was hoping to use to illustrate this bog, but when I tried to post them up, they all came up upside down so I've had to improvise!)

The Trousseau

Nicola here. Last night we had dinner with my mother-in-law and when I admired the beautiful, hand-embroidered table mats, she told me that she had made them in 1961 as part of her trousseau. That made me think; I hadn’t heard that word in such a long time and I have always loved the sound of it. And I also wondered whether people still had a trousseau or if it was another thing that has gone out of fashion.

The definition of “trousseau” is the clothes, linen, and other belongings collected by a bride for her marriage but originally the trousseau was the box itself. It’s also known as a hope chest or dowry chest, glory box or “bottom drawer.” It’s this last term that I remember from when I was growing up. My grandmother used to refer to putting things in your bottom drawer for when you got married, but by the time I married in the later 1980s things had changed!

The “cassone” of medieval Europe were large, decorated chests  like the one in teh picture that were extremely valuable in themselves and were a part of the dowry of a bride from a rich and/or aristocratic family. Elizabetta Gonzaga of Mantua and Guidobaldo da Montefeltro, Duke of Urbino, were betrothed in 1486 and married in 1488. In an inventory of Elisabetta’s trousseau corredo, compiled around 25th February 1488 was recorded: ‘Venti forzieri, dieci lavorati d’oro, dieci depinti a la divisa’ (twenty chests, ten gilded, ten painted with heraldic arms/devices" which included the flames of love. This was a trousseau on a very grand scale both in terms of the boxes and their contents!

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.

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.

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.

 

The Art of Dunking (A Biscuit)

Nicola here with a classic post from a few years ago that I originally posted on the UK Historical Romance Authors Blog. It got such an interesting response then that I thought I would update it and share it here because I was keen to hear what the Wenches and Wench readers thought of it.

So here goes. Do you dunk? I’m using the word “dunk” in the British sense of the word which means “to dip a biscuit or some other food, usually baked goods, into a drink, especially tea, coffee, or milk." Dunking releases more flavour from confections by dissolving the sugars, while also softening their texture. With the UK/US differences in language I had no idea about the basketball definition of dunking until I looked it up!

It turns out that dunking is an ancient tradition but it’s also a divisive one. Apparently in a recent survey done by the Great British Bake-Off TV Programme, 52% of people said they wouldn’t dream of dunking a biscuit – they never had and they never would!

Going Down the (Research) Rabbit Hole

Andrea here, musing on the stories we authors tell, and what sparks them. I get asked a lot about how I come up with ideas, and it’s impossible to give a simple answer. Inspiration comes in an infinite number of ways—many of them totally unexpected! And those serendipitous discoveries of fun things to weave into a plot often come from what many of us authors call the “Rabbit Hole” effect.

Sooo, what’s a Rabbit Hole? It’s what happens when I do a quick google search, meaning to spend a few minutes checking a simple fact or researching a specific fact . . . and lo and behold, some other detail within the text catches my eye. That results in another search, which leads to more fascinating details that draw me deeper and deeper into—you guessed it—the Rabbit Hole. (It can sometimes take hours to emerge!) (Above: Ernst Hermann Joseph von Münch)

Summer by the Sea

Nicola here talking about the summer holidays and the history of being beside the seaside. It’s the time of year in England when the schools are on holiday and as most people still aren’t able to travel abroad because of pandemic regulations, lots and lots of people are taking their holidays at home, particularly at the coast. The English weather being what it is, this is a risky occupation but a downpour of rain isn’t enough to put the hardy holidaymaker off! I can remember childhood holidays when the beach was so wet with rain coming down as well as the tide coming in that my sandcastles set like cement!

When I was a child (and I know that line makes me sound ancient) we took all our holidays at home, sometimes at the coast and sometimes in the countryside. Coming from Yorkshire, our favoured seaside resort was Scarborough on the east coast but we also visited family in Morecambe. In the 1920s and 30s my grandparents had been amongst the working-class crowds from Bradford who had taken their fortnight’s holiday at Morecambe. Here are my family enjoying an outing to the seaside in 1938!

Iceland – In the Footsteps of the Vikings (Part II)

Christina here. Today I continue the tale of my recent journey to Iceland. (You can find Part I here):-

A trip to Iceland would not be complete without a visit to two special places - Thingvellir (Þingvellir) and the Geysers. We drove south east to Thingvellir first, the place where the Vikings held their annual meetings (Alþingi) to dispense justice and decide on laws. It's a natural rock formation, a bit like a canyon with an amazing waterfall – Öxarárfoss – on one side. In a spectacular setting up on a hill overlooking a huge lake nearby, the waterfall came as a complete surprise. It’s hidden away among the rock formations that form two curtain walls, like fortifications on a castle. Views over the surrounding landscape are out of this world. There is a large grassy plateau below, where the Vikings taking part in the Alþingi would have raised their tents and camped out. When we were there, the place was incredibly windy and I nearly froze to death as the rocks acted like a wind tunnel. It was so cold!

Things improved at our next destination, the famous geyser Strokkur which wasn’t all that far away. The whole area smelled like rotten eggs because of the sulphur in the water, but it was fascinating to see the geyser erupt every five to seven minutes without warning. It was the only one at present, as another one nearby is dormant right now. All around were little smoking springs, as if the brown soil itself was smouldering. There were also pools of various sizes, beautiful and very inviting, but at 80-100 degrees extremely dangerous! You can’t even stick your hand in or your skin would burn off. Strokkur was not as big as I had imagined it, but still impressive and I’m so glad I got to see it.