Guest Beth Trissel: The French Revolution

Linda Banche here. Today my guest is fellow Wild Rose Press author, Beth Trissel. Beth's newest story is Into the Lion’s Heart, a novella set in England during the French Revolution and the first story in The Wild Rose Press's Love Letters series. Here she talks about the French Revolution.

Welcome Beth!

Beth Trissel:

My fascination with the past and those who have gone before us is the ongoing inspiration behind my work. With my first English historical romance, Into the Lion’s Heart, I more deeply explored my British heritage. Set in 1789 England, the story opens with the hero, Captain Dalton Evans (fought in the American Revolution) journeying to Dover to meet the ship carrying a distant cousin, Mademoiselle Sophia Devereux, who’s fleeing the French Revolution. My research into the explosion across the English Channel in 1789 made me aware of how many French émigrés fled the country in waves the initial year of the revolution. Many were aristocrats, including the king’s own brothers, along with members of the clergy, and some of the more well-to-do commoners. Most all of the aristocrats who did not flee while they still could were guillotined during the subsequent reign of terror. I chose to set Into the Lion’s Heart during that first year while there’s a great deal erupting in France but before it gets utterly grim.

Among key events in 1789 that caused émigrés to flee France: July 17, the beginning of the Great Fear, the peasantry revolt against feudalism and a number of urban disturbances and revolts. Insurrection and the spirit of popular sovereignty spread throughout France. In rural areas, many went beyond this: some burned title-deeds and no small number of châteaux.

And then there’s the Women's March on Versailles, one of the earliest and most significant events of the French Revolution. The march began among women in the marketplaces of Paris who, on the morning of 5 October 1789, were near rioting over the high price and scarcity of bread. Their demonstrations quickly became intertwined with the activities of revolutionaries who were seeking liberal political reforms and a constitutional monarchy for France. The market women and their various allies grew into a mob of thousands and, encouraged by revolutionary agitators, they ransacked the city armory for weapons and marched to the royal palace at Versailles. The crowd besieged the palace and in a violent confrontation successfully pressed their demands upon King Louis XVI. The next day, the crowd compelled the king, his family, and the entire French Assembly to return with them to Paris.”

King Louis XV1 and his queen Marie Antoinette never successfully escaped Paris and were later imprisoned and beheaded. From Women’s History: Reportedly planned by Marie Antoinette, the escape of the royal couple from Paris was stopped at Varennes on October 21, 1791. Imprisoned with the king, Marie Antoinette continued to plot. She hoped for foreign intervention to end the revolution and free the royal family. She urged her brother, the Holy Roman Emperor Leopold II, to intervene, and supported a declaration of war against Austria in April, 1792, which she hoped would result in the defeat of France. But it didn’t.

Blurb for INTO THE LION’S HEART: As the French Revolution rages, the English nobility offer sanctuary to many a refugee. Captain Dalton Evans arrives in Dover to meet a distant cousin, expecting to see a spoiled aristocrat. Instead, he's conquered by the simplicity of his new charge. And his best friend Thomas Archer isn't immune to her artless charm, either.

Cecile Beaumont didn't choose to travel across the Channel. And she certainly didn't expect that impersonating her own mistress would introduce her to a most mesmerizing man. Now she must play out the masquerade, or risk life, freedom – and her heart.

Into the Lion’s Heart is available at The Wild Rose Press, Amazon Kindle, Barnes & Noble, and other online booksellers.

For more on my work please visit my website: www.bethtrissel.com

My blog is the happening place: http://bethtrissel.wordpress.com/

Guest Leigh Michaels: Historical Wedding Cakes

Linda Banche here. Today I welcome Leigh Michaels and her latest fun-filled Regency historical, The Wedding Affair. Since The Wedding Affair takes place in the context of a wedding, Leigh talks about wedding cakes through the ages.

Leave a comment with your email address for a chance to win one of two SETS of Leigh's books which Sourcebooks has generously provided. Each set contains Mistress' House, Just One Season in London, and The Wedding Affair. That's three books to two lucky people! I've read all three books and I love them. Leigh will select the winners. Check the comments to see who won, and how to contact me to claim your book. If I cannot contact the winners within a week of selection, I will award the books to alternates. Note, Sourcebooks can mail to USA and Canada addresses only.

And the winners Leigh selected are KarenH and Kitchen Witch! Congratulations. I've sent you both emails. Thanks to all for coming.

Welcome Leigh!

Leigh Michaels:

Since The Wedding Affair is (surprise!) sort of about a wedding, I thought it would be appropriate to talk about the bride’s cake and its role in weddings for the last 300 years – since well before the Regency period where this book takes place.

Wedding pastries have been around pretty much forever, in one form or another. In the Roman Empire, a loaf of wheat or barley bread would be baked especially for the wedding, and the groom would eat part of it, then break the rest over the bride’s head to symbolize the dominance he was to have over her in their marriage. The guests would eat the crumbs as a wish for good luck.

Sweet cakes are a fairly recent development. In medieval times, cakes were bread-like with no sweetening, and in France, they were sometimes created from a pile of sweet rolls – rather like the new trend of stacking cupcakes into a tower. Sometimes a bride’s pie was featured – it might be made of fruit or meat, but it always including a hidden ring. The person who found the ring in their portion was thought to be the next to marry. (The tradition of sleeping with a piece of cake underneath one’s pillow, in the hope of dreaming about one’s future spouse, dates as far back as the 1600s.)

For many years the traditional wedding cake in England was a dark, rich fruitcake. That helps to explain the tradition of keeping a slice for the first anniversary, since fruitcake would last that long and still be edible.

But the truly fun story about weddings and cakes is that the many-tiered, tower-like cake that brides and grooms cut today isn’t actually a wedding cake at all. Its proper title is bride’s cake. And not because the groom often gets his own version in chocolate these days, either.

It’s been known as a bride’s cake since shortly after the Great London Fire of 1666, when much of the city burned and Sir Christopher Wren was commissioned to rebuild St. Paul’s Cathedral and dozens of churches which had been lost to the fire. One of them was St. Bride’s, located on Fleet Street in the city of London and featuring a fanciful four-tiered spire, octagonal in shape and reaching more than 225 feet above street level. The shape of this tower is said to have inspired the modern, multi-tiered, grand spectacle of a wedding cake.

In the 1800s a white cake with white icing would have been a statement of wealth, since the highly-refined sugar needed to produce a white pastry was very expensive. And a tiered cake made before the invention of pillars to help support the weight was mostly created for looks -- the upper layers were made of lightweight spun sugar rather than actual cake (which would have been heavy enough to collapse into the bottom layers).

The sugary icings and fondants used to decorate modern cakes weren’t invented until late in the Victorian era, and pillars didn’t appear till after 1900. Wedding toppers – the small figures of bride and groom – became popular only in the 1950s.

Oh, and what I said at the beginning about the book being “sort of” about a wedding?… the three romances in The Wedding Affair are prompted by the wedding, but they aren’t directly connected. In fact, the wedding itself is mostly in the background. It’s what Alfred Hitchcock called “the McGuffin” – the thing which in his case caused the chase or the murder or the thrill ride, and in my case causes the romance. My three heroes and three heroines are much more interested in the affairs they’re having than they are in the wedding!

So what about you? Did you keep a piece of your wedding cake for a later anniversary? Do you still have a slice in your freezer? Tell us about it – maybe how long you kept it, how many times you moved it from house to house or state to state, and how you celebrated with it!

THE WEDDING AFFAIR BY LEIGH MICHAELS – IN STORES SEPTEMBER 2011
You’re invited to the wedding of the year!
The Duke of Somervale, whose sister’s wedding is the event of the ton, is fighting off debutantes and desperately needs help from beautiful, stubborn Olivia Reyne. But she is engrossed with problems engulfing her dearest friends and family. The last thing Olivia needs is to be embroiled with a duke whose dark gaze makes her forget herself entirely...

Discover a new side of a beloved author as Leigh Michaels draws you into the glittering, glitzy world of Regency England and an affair you’ll never forget.

About the Author
Leigh Michaels is the author of nearly 100 books, including 80 contemporary novels, more than a dozen non-fiction books and three Regency romances from Sourcebooks Casablanca: The Mistress’ House, Just One Season in London and The Wedding Affair. More than 35 million copies of her romance novels have been published by Harlequin. A 6 time RITA finalist, she has also received two Reviewer's Choice awards from RT Book Reviews, and was the 2003 recipient of the Johnson Brigham Award. Leigh also teaches romance writing on the Internet at Gotham Writers’ Workshop. She lives in Ottumwa, Iowa. For more information, please visit www.leighmichaels.com.

Are Contests Worth the Price?

As writers, we’ve all either entered contests or been tempted to. Most contests have an entry fee, and it’s sometimes difficult to justify the expenditure. In addition to the fee, there are shipping expenses, and sometimes, if you final, you have additional expense. More and more contests are going to digital, which makes entering a little easier.
As an author, I’ve been on both sides of the table, judging several contests, and entering them too, throughout my writing career. From the judge’s side, I’ll tell you I’d much rather sit down with a cup of tea and read through entries, than stare at the same monitor I’ve worked at all day. I print out digital entries, because so far I’ve not bought a reader, although I’m looking at tablets.
With earlier manuscripts, my entries didn’t reach the mark. But after many workshops and classes on the craft of writing, I saw a sea-change in the scores.
Now on to the wisdom of entering contests. A writer, unless you’ve won the lottery, should be selective about contests.
First, do a little research to see if this is a legitimate contest or simply a scam. It’s pretty easy to find out. If the contest is sponsored by a legitimate writers’ group, like an RWA chapter or Historical Novel Society, or by a state association like Florida Writers, you know it’s legit.
Next, read the details to see who is judging. Don’t look at the prize money or the award. Except for the most prestigious awards, the prizes aren’t big. The real win, the biggest reward, is that you can use a nice win to catch the eye of an agent or editor. Most admit that contest wins get their attention.
Thirdly, look to see if the contest returns comments, or only scores. If a contest offers feedback, it’s like getting a mini-critique.
An aside, and one worth noting for published and unpublished writers: strangely, there are contests which do not take Advanced Reading Copies. Your professionally-edited book can/must be entered in unpublished, if the release date falls after a certain date. This seems to me a bit unfair to an unpublished author who has to compete with my edited book. I don’t really understand the reasoning for not accepting an ARC.
Google literary awards for your state. I took a chance and entered Florida Book Awards, sponsored by the state Humanities Council and Florida State University. There was a fee, and we had to mail a book to each of the judges, a time-consuming job, but it was worth every minute when I received that Bronze Medallion at the Awards dinner for The Tapestry Shop. Recently, I entered a small local contest. To my surprise, all three finalists’ entries were sent to places like HarperCollins, Medallion, etc. for final judging. Not only that, the contest offered a breakdown of genres, so that my historical wouldn’t be lost in the Mainstream category, or bunched in with SciFi.
To my delight, both my two entries finaled. One went to Medallion, the YA went to HarperCollins for final judging. After reading comments from both editors (one of whom gave me First Place for my historical. I went to work and revised according to their suggestions. No, I didn’t get a contract, but now, in a query letter, I can say “an editor at Medallion gave this story First Place in the final round of judging”. How cool is that? Feedback from an editor, and bragging rights, all for forty-five dollars. This contest, sponsored by a local writers’ group, was opened to non-members, too. So look at local and regional contests. I know, it’s like buying a lottery ticket, but you can’t win without trying.

Pirates...scoundrels or romantic heroes?

Why are people so fascinated by pirates?

As a child, one of my favorite rides at Disneyland was "The Pirates of the Caribbean. I loved Peter Pan, Treasure Island, and any other pirate story I found. Pirates of the Caribbean, the movie, made millions with fans divided between Captain Jack Sparrow and Will, who pretty much turned pirate to save Elizabeth. When my husband and I were in Las Vegas, we went to the (then) new Treasure Island Hotel which used to (maybe still does?) put on a great show outside with a reenactment of the navy battling pirates. When the pirates defeated the navy, everybody cheered.

Really? We cheered when the good guys lost and the bad guys won?

Are we all a bunch of sociopaths?

Nah. I think it goes back to the bad boy allure. Bad boys, and pirates in particular, are non-conformists. They have the courage to buck the system. Pirates wore blousy white shirts instead of those stuffy coats and ugly hats and white powdered wigs that fashionable English and American gentlemen wore in the 1700's. They were totally free to go where ever they pleased and do anything they wanted. And they had the money to do it, thanks to the plunder they took. And in the case of Las Vegas, the pirate captain was hunky and drop-dead gorgeous, which never hurts :-)

We think of pirates as swashbuckling hunks who carried big curved swords, laughed, loved and lived freely. And having an eye patch and a parrot on the shoulder is pretty cool, too, not to mention a certain allure to a map with an X that marks the spot to buried booty--enough to live on like kings.

Maybe we all secretly wish we could steal from the rich, throw social norms out the window, and make our enemies walk the plank. Maybe we wish we could hold a sword to the throat of someone who tries to keep us down.

It's really just a fantasy. Real pirates are nothing like the men in the stories, as I discovered when I researched them for my Regency pirate romance novel, The Guise of a Gentleman.

Though the "Golden Age of Piracy" began in the 1700's, there have been pirates since the beginning of ships and sailing, and there are still pirates today. By the Regency Era, pirates weren't as prevalent as the Golden Age of Piracy, but after the end of the Napoleonic War, a lot of sailors, especially privateers, found themselves out of work. A few of them turned to piracy.

Because most of these pirates preyed upon foreign vessels, the British government sorta turn a blind eye to them. In my story, they formed a pirate ring, but that didn't happen in real life that we know.

Though a pirate's life seemed filled with glamor and adventure, most pirates were, first and foremost, sailors. Much of their daily life involved staying alive against the unforgiving sea. Off-shore reefs, changing sandbars, storms, the threat of fire, other ships, lack of drinkable water, and shortage of food filled constantly threatened their lives. To my knowledge, there was no such thing as walking the plank--that appears to be a myth created by Robert Louis Stevenson. Nor did pirates bury their treasure--they took it to the nearest port and sold it on the black market or they spent it on women and food and drink. Often, though, pirates sacked entire towns when they came ashore, looking for blood and more plunder instead of just a party. There are many stories of torture, rapine, and destruction. They even sank down to the level of slave trading.

Sorta destroys the romantic image, doesn't it?

Pirates enjoyed something navy sailors did not--a voice in decisions and fair treatment. On board a pirate ship, all the sailors got to have a vote in what they did, where they landed, etc. They even voted on who would be captain who had ultimate authority only during battle. The rest of the time, it was share and share alike--the same hard work, the same food, the same living conditions.

In my pirate Regency romance novel, The Guise of a Gentleman the hero, Jared Amesbury, gets orders from the government to pose as a pirate to help discover the head of a pirate ring. Although I showed a lot of what real pirates were like--ruthless, unpredictable, without conscience, blood-thirsty--most of Jared's men are just sailors and some of them even have a heart because Jared had weeded out the worst of the reprobates when he took over as captain. Jared, of course, is super hunky and wonderful and he's also very conflicted. Balancing fantasy with realism is a challenge in every story, but I have to admit, The Guise of a Gentleman was one of the most fun to write.

I think pirates will always capture our imagination and be the stuff of fantasy. So enjoy the fantasy. And "Argh, matey! Don' forgit yer sword!"

How Much I Know About the Regency

More than I used to. *g*

I will never know everything, but part of the fun is finding out new things.

About six years ago, when I got it into my head the idea to write a regency, I looked for library books on the subject. One of the books I found was What Jane Austen Ate and Charles Dickens Knew by Daniel Pool.

I was in alt. Here was a list of lots of the things I read about in regencies, but had no idea what they were. Pounds and pence, Parliament sessions, Whitsunday and Michaelmas, quarter days and consols, pelisses, footmen and scullery maids. I was also totally confused. How would I ever remember all this stuff?

I recently reread the book. And, lo and behold, much of the information has become second nature. I guess I've learned a lot in the past few years.

Some will scoff at the book. What Jane Austen Ate and Charles Dickens Knew covers both the Regency and the Victorian eras, so not everything is valid for the Regency. And the information is general. But the book is a good overview and has an extensive bibliography and a great glossary.

I will always make errors, and I hope my readers will be forgiving because I try to get things right.

Thank you all,
Linda

The picture is Carlton House, the Prince Regent's home during the Regency.

The Dog Days of Summer

The Dog Days of Summer are the hottest, most sweltering days of the year. Depending on your location, they run for about a month between early July to the beginning of September in the northern hemisphere, and from January to March in the southern hemisphere.

The term "Dog Days" refers to the days when Sirius, the Dog Star, rises with the sun.

The ancient Egyptians associated Horus, the dog-headed god, with Sirius, the brightest star in the constellation Canis Major (The Greater Dog) and the brightest star in the night sky. During this time, Sirius rose at dawn during the most blistering part of summer. The Egyptians, Greeks and Romans believed the bright Sirius, so close to the sun, added its radiation to the sun's, increasing the season's already fierce heat.

To the ancients, these sultry days, when rainfall is at its lowest and temperature its highest, was an evil time, causing suffering and disease in man and beast. Food spoiled, dogs went mad and all creatures languished in the stifling atmosphere.

Due to the precession of the equinoxes (the change in the earth's orientation to the night sky as our globe revolves around the galactic center), Sirius no longer rises at daybreak on the same dates as it did for the ancient Mediterranean civilizations. In the Roman era, the Dog Days ran from July 24 through August 24. Today, the Dog Days run from July 3 to August 11, according to The Old Farmers' Almanac, although many European cultures adhere to the original dates.

So, if you're awake before dawn during the peak of summer, take a look at the eastern sky. That bright star near the horizon is Sirius, heralding the Dog Days of Summer.

Thank you all,
Linda

The picture, from Wikipedia, is of Canis Major. Sirius marks the dog's nose.

Guest Grace Burrowes: The Windham Family

Linda Banche here. Today I welcome back New York Times best-selling author Grace Burrowes, author of the Regency historicals The Heir and The Soldier, with more to come. Her series tells the story of the Windham family, and, I admit, I'm somewhat confused about the relationships between the family members. In this post, Grace has kindly explained a little about all the delicious characters she has created.

Leave a comment with your email address for a chance to win a signed copy of either The Heir or The Soldier (I'm drooling, but I'm not eligible), or one of two signed ARCs of The Virtuoso, which Grace has generously provided. That's THREE chances to win! So comment away! Check back here to see who won.

Grace will also sign your e-copies using Kindlegraph, for those who already have The Heir and/or The Soldier in eformat. Any eformat will work.

The winners Grace selected are: Karen H and Toni for The Virtuoso, Phyllis C for The Heir, and Bonnie for The Soldier. Thanks to all for coming over.

Welcome back, Grace!

Grace Burrowes:

Which Windham?

I’m happily at work on the seventh book in an eight-book sibling series featuring the offspring of Percival Windham, the Duke of Moreland, but I must confess I never foresaw starting my career as a published author with such an ambitious project. Like many aspiring writers, I entered a lot of contests in an effort to get professional feedback on my manuscripts, and when it came time to pitch, of the twenty or so completed manuscripts I had, I chose the contest winners to send in to an editor.

There’s a problem with this approach: My contest champ was “The Heir,” which in addition to being about a third son, was also my fifth completed MS in a related series. Hmm. My editor at Sourcebooks figured out that I’d completed books about two of the hero’s brothers, and a trilogy was born. When the first book did fairly well, we decided to write stories for the five Windham sisters, and the rest, one hopes, will be bestseller history.

This has taxed the patience of many of my readers, and what follows is an attempt to fill in some blanks regarding the Windham family.

The oldest child is Maggie, a by-blow of the duke’s conceived prior to his marriage. The duke and duchess have adopted her, but she maintains her own establishment, being well past marriageable age… or so she thinks. Her story is slated for publication in May 2012 as “Lady Maggie’s Secret Scandal.”

Next comes Devlin St. Just, another by-blow who joined the ducal household at the age of five. His story is “The Soldier” which came out in June 2011.

The oldest legitimate son is Bartholomew, or Lord Bart. Friction between His Grace and Bart go so bad that when Bart asked to join Wellington’s cavalry, his parents permitted it. Alas, Lord Bart came to grief in Portugal when he mistook a decent woman for a soiled dove and her menfolk took lethal exception.

Next in line we have Gayle, the Earl of Westhaven (Bart had used the courtesy title Marquis of Pembroke). As a spare Gayle envisioned himself going into the legal profession, but we saw a happier fate befall him in “The Heir,” which was published in December 2010.

And this is where it gets a trifle tricky, because we have another Windham brother resting in peace as a result of consumption, Lord Victor, though Victor left a daughter behind. The story of little Rose and her mother’s involvement with first Victor and then Douglas, Viscount Amery, goes by the working title of “The Proper Peer.” His Grace’s matrimonial fixations create significant havoc for Guinevere and Douglas on the road to their happily ever after. I hope this book becomes available at least for e-readers in early 2012.

The youngest brother, Valentine, is familiar to readers as an accomplished musician and his story, “The Virtuoso,” comes out in November.

Which leaves us with the four remaining sisters, in order of planned publication: “Lady Sophie’s Christmas Wish” comes out in October 2011, to be followed by stories for Lady Eve, Lady Louisa, and Lady Genevieve, the last two also being planned as Christmas books.

When my website is up sometime in the next few weeks, I intend to have a family tree available to keep the Windham batting order organized for my readers. It won’t stop there, though. The Windhams have friends, neighbors, cousins and other associations, all of whom are clamoring for books. In fact, I heard a rumor the other day even Lord Bart might have left a small legacy…

Thanks so much for coming over, Grace.

Readers, don't forget to leave a comment!