Guest post by Carson Morton, author of STEALING MONA LISA

I'm delighted to welcome Carson Morton, author of the debut historical mystery STEALING MONA LISA. Set in 1911, this novel is based on the real-life theft of Leonardo da Vinci's masterpiece from the Louvre in Paris - an event I knew nothing about and was fascinated to discover. This is a sophisticated, suspense-laden evocation of a thrilling crime, with enough twists and turns to keep you reading well past bedtime. Elegantly written, it features a wonderful, diverse cast of characters, including a charming master thief, a street orphan, a volatile forger, a beautiful pickpocket, and of course the priceless painting and Art Deco-era Paris herself - which Mr Morton has recreated in all her elegant, dangerous and irresistible contradictions. Please join me in welcoming Carson Morton.

Boots (well, sneakers) on the Ground

by Carson Morton

Until a few years ago, the closest I had ever come to Paris was as an eleven year old boy, emigrating with my family from England to the United States. The Queen Mary steamed out of Southampton and docked for the night in Cherbourg to take on more passengers. I slept through the whole thing. So I found myself, many years later, working with my first editor, Marie, on the manuscript to my novel, STEALING MONA LISA, set, naturally enough, in Paris. She casually asked if I had ever been to France. Does being fast asleep in Cherbourg count? She gave me a look, turned back to the manuscript , and simply said, “Well, you need to go.” Six months later, I checked into my hotel in the Marais district, bleary-eyed but excited after sleeping a good twenty minutes on the flight over. Immediately I hit the streets to head for the Seine. Within minutes I was totally lost in the meandering, medieval streets of the Marais, one of the oldest sections of Paris, loving every minute of it. Eventually, I walked out onto the Pont Neuf for my first sight of the Seine, Notre Dame, and in the distance, standing proudly above the mansard roofs of the city, the Eiffel Tower. It’s an experience that everyone needs to have at least once in their life, preferably twice.

The thing was that my novel was already finished. I had chosen the locations of my story through careful research online and in books, and I felt fairly confident I had made all the right choices. I was soon to discover, however, that was not necessarily the case. The plan was simple: walk through my story to make sure all the pieces fit. My first stop was a sequestered series of courtyards, known collectively as the Cour du Rohan, just of the bustling Boulevard St. Germain in the St. Germain des Pres area. It was a bit tricky to find at first but, armed with my handy-dandy Moleskin Paris City Notebook, I soon found myself walking across the cobblestones of the first courtyard. Barely minutes from a major boulevard, the Cour du Rohan’s cloistered serenity was a welcome respite from the bustling city. I had chosen the courtyard as the location of the boarding house of Madame Charneau where the mastermind and his cohorts plan the heist of the century. I found the location in a “Paris – Then and Now” book and was encouraged by the fact that it had been used for some of the exterior shots in the movie, Gigi. I had gotten it a 100 percent right. The atmosphere, location, and physical layout were perfect. At this rate, I wasn’t going to have to make any changes at all!

Next stop was the Louvre Museum. Armed with my trusty Paris museum pass, I strolled in and made a beeline for the Salon Carré, the original home of the Mona Lisa. The painting was moved in 2005 to the Salle des Etats where it resides in its own free-standing wall hiding behind bullet-proof glass. It’s typically awash in a sea of tourists but instead of the songs of seabirds, one hears the phrase, “I didn’t realize it was so small,” spoken in dozens of languages. Much nicer to stand by myself in the Salon Carre before the spot where, a hundred years ago, Vincenzo Peruggia walked up, took it off the wall, and stuck it up his blouse. So far so good, but then came the dawn. I had the thieves making their way out through the wrong side of the museum. There’s no way they would go all the way over to the Passage Richeleiu on the rue de Rivoli when all they had to do was descend a maintenance stairwell to the Quai des Tuileries to make their escape across the Seine. This part I had gotten dead wrong and couldn’t wait to get home to my computer to make the necessary changes. Well, actually I was in Paris for another five days, so I definitely could wait.

Now, there was only one piece missing, the location of the house of the Marquis de Valfierno, the mastermind behind the plan to sell six copies of The Mona Lisa to unsuspecting American Robber Barons. I pondered this as I made my way through the meandering streets of the Marais and turned into rue Picardie, a street barely wide enough for one vehicle, and made my way back to my small hotel, the hotel du Vieux Saule which had obviously once been a grand house…. wait a minute! This was perfect. A house tucked away on a small side street, hidden deep within the labyrinth of streets that make up the Marais.

Not only did I spend a wonderful week in the world’s most beautiful city, but my book would be greatly improved. And, with any luck, next time I stay in that hotel I’ll bring along a copy of the book and maybe they’ll give me a special rate!

Thank you, Carson. We wish you the best of success! To learn more about Carson and his work, please visit his website.

Guest post from Melanie McDonald, author of EROMENOS

The Roman emperor Hadrian has always fascinated me. I love Marguerite Yourcenar's Memoirs of Hadrian and devour any other book on him I can find. Unfortunately, there aren't that many, so I was delighted to hear about Melanie McDonald's EROMENOS, about the Greek youth Antinous of Bithynia's affair with the emperor during the second century CE—a relationship far more intimate than Hadrian’s sanctioned political marriage. I'm also very pleased to welcome Melanie here on the first league of her virtual tour with Historical Fiction Virtual Tours.

Please join me in welcoming Melanie McDonald!

In Eromenos, my debut novel, the Greek youth Antinous of Bithynia recounts his affair with the Roman emperor Hadrian during the second century CE—a relationship far more intimate than Hadrian’s sanctioned political marriage, though it lasted only seven years. Readers have asked why I decided to write about Antinous and Hadrian. Although I knew a little about Hadrian, because of the wall he had built on the border between present-day Scotland and England to keep barbarian tribes out of Roman Britain, I had not heard of Antinous until I read the novel Memoirs of Hadrian by Marguerite Yourcenar.

These two were real people, not fictional characters, yet their story involves the same eternal verities—sex, love, death, loss, power, transformation—as classic love stories found throughout mythology, literature and the arts, in works like Orpheus and Eurydice, Romeo and Juliet and Aïda. Even after two thousand years, the story of Antinous and Hadrian remains too complex, sad and beautiful ever to be lost to the dust of antiquity (or, for that matter, to the sludge of homophobia). I began to read non-fiction historical works about Antinous and Hadrian, and was struck by how none of these sources ever revealed any thoughts or words attributed to Antinous, although his beautiful image still may be found in works of art in museums around the world. History had silenced Antinous. I hoped that another version of their story, told this time from his point of view, might be able to give back a voice to this young Greek, the beloved of Hadrian, who seemed to have none.

I enjoyed doing the research for Eromenos. At first, I just wanted to know enough about life in Rome in the second century CE to make the story believable for those readers who happen to be knowledgeable about the era. The deeper I dug into life at Hadrian’s court, however, the more I discovered about the many other interesting individuals who had surrounded Antinous there. I knew they would make wonderful characters in a novel. Take Favorinus of Gaul: A hermaphrodite once accused of cuckolding a powerful Roman citizen, a “barbarian” who spoke perfect Greek (his accent was better than Hadrian’s), he kept up a running feud with Polemo of Smyrna, another philosopher of Hadrian’s retinue. Only Favorinus, though, was nervy enough to contradict even the emperor on occasion.

Another court member who fascinated me was a physician, Marcellus Sidetes, who wrote about the symptoms of and possible treatments for lycanthropy. Yes, werewolves, in ancient Rome. Marcellus notes that those afflicted: ". . .go out by night in the month of February, hanging about tombs and behaving like dogs or wolves until morning returns, leaving them hollow-eyed, dry-tongued, listless, and thirsty."*

Marcellus writes as well about his own experiments in treating injured gladiators. The battlefield always has provided gruesome inspiration for the surgeon. New weapons inflict terrible new wounds upon human flesh, and this in turn calls for the healers to devise new techniques in the sometimes futile attempt to treat these injuries.

Given the accomplishments of such individuals, why not play around with the idea that Antinous, the famous beauty, also serves as a source of inspiration for others at court, not just for Hadrian? So the novel also explores the idea of Antinous as muse, and shows how he may have listened to this physician about his theories, or encouraged that philosopher to gather his thoughts in book form, or suggested that a fellow Bithynian, Arrian, write down those stories he told about hunting and hounds. Beauty and power often have found themselves bedfellows—and beauty has a power all its own, albeit one more fleeting and fragile than other kinds of power.

Once the actual writing got underway, I gave myself permission to take some liberties—to make up interactions between Antinous and other individuals at court, and even to make up characters, such as the servant girl Calliria, to serve the story. Eromenos is a work of fiction, after all, not a factual account of history. And although it’s a story with a tragic ending, I tried to incorporate scenes of humor and discovery, as well. The court of Hadrian included the most brilliant minds to be found in the empire, and Hadrian himself was extremely intelligent and well educated, engaged in many areas of study, including architecture, literature, art, poetry, and philosophy. The imperial court of Hadrian, fourteenth emperor of Rome, must have been an amazing place in which to come of age for a bright, educated, beautiful young man like Antinous.

Eromenos was a pleasure to write, and I hope it proves a pleasure for readers, too. Thanks very much, Christopher, and happy ear-rubs for Paris the Corgi from me!

Thank you, Melanie! For more information about Melanie and her work, please see her website.

*Marcellus Sidetes, translated by Daniel Ogden in Magic, Witchcraft and Ghosts in the Greek and Roman Worlds: A Sourcebook, Oxford University Press, New York, 2002. Quoted in Eromenos, p. 113, by permission.

Guest post from Donna Russo Morin, author of TO SERVE A KING

I'm delighted and honored to welcome Donna Russo Morin, author of several adventurous historical novels set in Italy and France, including her latest novel, TO SERVE A KING. Donna always offers exciting fresh settings and intriguing plots; this marvelous guest post from her offers a glimpse into Donna's creative process.

Please join me in welcoming Donna Russo Morin.

I consider myself extraordinarily blessed that my profession allows me the indulgence of historical research. Self-confessed nerd, I happily spend hours, days, weeks, months with my nose stuck firmly in centuries old public records, estate accounts, and paper-and-ink-pungent text books, pouring over account after account of any one man or woman’s life. A sketch is rendered, it’s given dates of birth and death and momentous moments, its clothed in activities and choices and consequence. But it is a flat translation, so like the paper dolls I played with as a child, with little consideration of emotional motivation. Perhaps it is my own sensitive nature, perhaps it is the psychology degree I obtained by accident, but as I lay the clunky antiseptic tomes aside, lean my head back, and close my eyes, my mind—and my muse—ruminate on the emotions—the elation and the torment—that is the true essence of any human life.

In my first book, The Courtier’s Secret (2009) it was the Sun King, Louis XIV, who intrigued me the most. The charismatic, libidinous man dedicated his life to the puppet-master manipulation of his nobles, creating ritual after ritual, requirement heaped upon requirement—many of such convolution that few could wade through the depths and succeed in finding his favor. In truth, none would ever truly have it, for the man who would be the longest ruling sovereign in France’s history hated all nobles with caustic venom. His life would be forever imprinted by the fear such nobles had infused in him when, as a child, they threatened his life and that of his mother in the rebellion known as the Fronde. It was a childhood trauma—as devastating and long-lasting as any abuse. Heedless of the child in their midst, the blue-bloods of the age came at his home with weapons and anger, vicious hate upon their tongues. From the moment he reached his majority, from beneath the guise of rule, Louis would make them pay for their violent disloyalty for the rest of his life. And yet it was these very actions—his dedication to be the most privileged king of all—which would lead to the destruction of his progeny, a heart-rending vicious circle of emotional flotsam, the thick, gooey stuff that pronounces us as humans, not just a compendium of dates.

Genius, fanatical curiosity, profound religious beliefs crashing against scientific fervor…all this and much more percolated beneath the surface of Galileo Galilei. But perhaps the most formidable undercurrent of his life was the haunting command of survivor’s guilt. As portrayed in my 2010 release, The Secret of the Glass, Galileo was the only man to survive a bizarre encounter from which others were not so fortunate. While on a walking tour of the Tuscan region, thirty-eight-year-old Galileo and a few of his migliori amici, his most beloved friends, were inadvertently exposed to the noxious vapors festering from out of the Caves of Costozza. Each one died, save Galileo. Though he too was stricken with illness, an auto-immune-like condition that would plague him the rest of his days, it was his guilt as the sole survivor that impelled him to make his life—the only spared on that fatal day—worthy of the gift. It kept him resolute, even as the Vatican itself did its utmost to grind him and his heretical scientific work to a halt. Galileo’s deep and abiding need, one too powerful to be denied, coupled with his beliefs, would allow no such obstruction, no matter the cost.

My latest release, To Serve a King, is based on nothing if not the proposition that with true remorse, one may find true redemption. It is true of my main fictional character; it is true of the king that haunts her so. François I is forever portrayed as a cruel and lecherous hedonist, and justifiably so. But little is said of him in his years of decline. When writing François I, I was not unmindful or blind to his brutish youth, however I was deeply aware of the personal hardships he had encountered—the loss of spouse, the loss of beloved children, the slow torture of watching his own power diminish as he aged. In the major biographies read during my research, I found a great dichotomy between his early years and those of his latter days. I was struck by the notion, and the hope, that we have the ability to become truly conscious beings and in the clarity of vision such consciousness affords, we can look back and see the road behind us with all its potholes and wrong turns. It is distasteful to have regrets—the acidity sticks in the craw and repeats offensively—but if conscious of their power, the enlightened can use them to find remorse, and it is in remorse that we are redeemed. Thus was how I found François; it is how I wrote him. I can say with certainty there was a wish in such a rendering.

I’ve lately just finished my next book, the first where I base a main character on the life of an actual person. But in this, The King’s Agent, as in my others, the true question will not be what he did—the illegal procurement of precious works of art—but why he did it.

I was recently asked in an interview what it was that most intrigued me about historical fiction and I answered…the human experience, that which is found deep within every one that shares this existence… human experiences that are unchanged whether ten days or ten centuries apart. It is that resounding repetition that I seek to uncover as I immerse myself—happily, readily—to those hours, days, weeks, and months of research.

Thank you, Donna! To learn more about Donna and her work, please visit her website.

Guest post from Helen Hollick, author of SEA WITCH

I'm honored to welcome Helen Hollick as part of her 2011 tour for the re-release of her exciting SEA WITCH series. I've been a fan of Helen's work since her debut Arthurian-themed novel, The Kingmaking; her pirate books featuring the rakish, sexy, unpredictable Captain Jesamiah offer a galleon-load of adventure, danger, and fun, and are now available in brand-new beautiful editions from Silverwood Books.

Please join me in welcoming Helen Hollick.

The setting sail of my Sea Witch series of pirate-based historical adventure fantasy books has not been all calm seas and fair winds. But it has been fun and immensely exciting! When historical fiction was foundering on the rocks of unpopularity a few years ago, my (ex) agent suggested I write something more “sellable”. “What about Harry Potter?” she said.
“Well I don’t really write teenage or fantasy do I?”I grimaced back. This was the Bespectacled Wizard period – prior to the Twinkly Vampire phase. It was also the opening manoeuvres of Johnny Depp’s Jack Sparrow, though. And a pirate novel appealed…Enjoying the first Pirates of the Caribbean movie, The Curse of the Black Pearl, I had become intrigued by the facts of the Golden Age of Piracy – a short-lived period in history, from the late 17th – early 18th Century.
Soon after my dispiriting chat with my agent, the entire plot and most of the characters came to me one afternoon in late October, while on vacation in Dorset, England. I remember the afternoon well.

It was drizzling with rain and I had the entire beach to myself. I looked out at the grey English Channel and saw instead the sparkling blue of the Caribbean (proves I have a fertile imagination!) I started writing as soon as I got back to the hotel, and didn’t stop for the next three months, except for Christmas Day when I took pity on my family who had almost forgotten what I looked like. My agent hated the result. “This isn’t for boys!” she exclaimed.
Er, no. I don’t write for children. I write adult fiction. I specifically wrote Sea Witch for the many adults (especially us swooning ladies) who enjoyed the movie, loved Jack Sparrow even more, and were desperate for similar pirate-based fiction to read.

There are plenty of nautical fiction books around; Hornblower, Patrick O’Brian – the fabulous Frenchman’s Creek… but nothing that came even remotely close to the excitement, humour, fantasy - and sex-appeal, of Captain Sparrow. As a writer the solution had seemed simple and obvious. Write the book I wanted to read. My agent did not believe me when I told her adults wanted to read pirate adventures, and historical adventure fantasy. She told me to write it for teenage boys. I stuck to my 9lb pirate guns and refused. I knew I had a good story. I knew my main character - Jesamiah Acorne - had the potential to, one day, become a winner.
So my agent and I parted company, and I was simultaneously informed that my UK publisher had decided to not re-publish my back list.

It looked like my writing career was finished. I sobbed for two weeks, then pulled myself together and found a small independent UK company who offered to take me on with their even smaller mainstream imprint. There were a few hiccups, and the books were not as well produced as I would have liked – but at least Sea Witch, and my backlist - having regained the rights, were in print. I went on to write two more Jesamiah stories and Sourcebooks Inc in the US picked up my serious historical fiction – the Pendragon’s Banner Trilogy, Forever Queen (entitled A Hollow Crown here in the UK) and I am the Chosen King (Harold the King in the UK) I was back in business again – plus I am co-scriptwriter for a planned movie 1066. Everything was looking good. Fate has a habit of bursting your bubble doesn’t it?

In early spring, my UK publisher hit financial problems and I found myself, once again, on the verge of being out of print here in the UK. I was not going to let that happen. I adore my characters and value my readers too much, so using a small legacy inherited from my Mum, I took my books to a UK assisted publishing house – SilverWood Books. Not having my files I have undertaken a mammoth re-edit of all my books. The Arthurian Trilogy is to be completed but Harold the King, Sea Witch, Pirate Code and Bring It Close are in print here in the UK, with the Sea Witch Voyages out very soon via Amazon.com (and hopefully in bookstores, although it is hard for UK writers to get books into US stores, even if I am officially a Bestselling Author with Forever Queen!)

I have faith in my charmer of a rogue pirate, so as soon as Amazon manages to list the books Jesamiah will be making full sail with all guns cleared for action! I describe him as Sharpe, Hornblower, Indiana Jones and Jack Sparrow all rolled into one; and the books as a “sailors yarn”. They are based on historical fact – although I do bend accuracy a little (liberties are clarified in my author’s note.) My nautical scenes are as accurate as I can get them, thanks to editing by US maritime author James L. Nelson, and the fantasy elements are more akin to the Star Wars Force, not Harry Potter wizardry, for all that Jesamiah’s woman, Tiola Oldstagh, is a white witch!

There are storms at sea, pirate chases; fighting, humour and romance – the goddess of the sea, who wants Jesamiah for herself and Jesamiah’s ghost of a father - everything expected in an adventure series! As Elizabeth Chadwick kindly endorses (she loves the books, I am delighted to say): "A wonderful swash-buckler of a novel. Fans of Pirates of the Caribbean will love this to pieces of eight! Prepare to be abducted by a devil-may-care pirate and enchanted by a white witch. Helen Hollick has written a fabulous historical adventure that will have you reading into the small hours!" I hope so!

To learn more about Helen and her work, please visit her website
or visit the Sea Witch page

Guest post from Colin Falconer, author of WHEN WE WERE GODS

I'm delighted and honored to welcome Colin Falconer, acclaimed author of several historical novels, including the sumptuous The Sultan's Harem and one of my favorites on the infamous Cleopatra, WHEN WE WERE GODS. Years ago, before I was published and I was slogging through the submission/rejection/nervous breakdown cycle, Colin was one of my inspirations - a male historical fiction author who wrote gorgeous novels from both male, and female, points of view. In celebration of the recent release of When We Were Gods on Kindle, for a whole new generation of readers to enjoy, Colin has offered this marvelous guest post on the story behind his evocation of Egypt's last pharaoh.

Please join me in welcoming Colin Falconer!

I recently re-released a new edition of WHEN WE WERE GODS, my novel about Cleopatra, on Kindle. In revising and tightening the manuscript I was struck again by two things: first, what a fantastic story it is. If it wasn’t all true, it would be hard to believe: thirty years before Jesus, an eighteen year old princess tries to take over the world? Outrageous. Cleopatra was a woman with real cojones. She took on Roman military and political power at the apogee of its power. If she had succeeded – and she very nearly did – we can only speculate what the world would be like today. Because, contrary to popular belief, she didn’t spend all her time bathing in asses' milk, cozying up to Richard Burton and having her hair bobbed. The real Cleopatra was a consummate political animal, with extraordinary ambition, a rare talent for what we would today call spin and the instincts of a street fighter.

The other thing that struck me – yet again - was what a tricky thing it is writing history. Like most historical fiction authors I have copped some criticism over the years for ‘getting it all wrong.’ From time to time a reviewer has criticised my research when in fact what they are criticising is my choice. Anyone who has done any sort of reading of the past will have found that most historians can never agree on anything. (It only takes one classical scholar in an empty room to start an argument.) What authors often have to do is make a best guess between two conflicting sets of theories. For example: for all her notoriety, we do not even know what Cleopatra really looked like.But surely, you say – she looked like Elizabeth Taylor?Well, no.

Some historians even speculate that Cleopatra may have been blonde. As she was part Macedonian, there's a fair chance, so to speak. I toyed with the idea of having Cleopatra as a blonde in WHEN WE WERE GODS, to show that I had done my research and to distance myself from the movie. (Also so that Scarlett Johanssen could play the role in my film. Or, at least, in my fantasies.) But my publisher said to me: you can't do that. (Have a blonde Cleopatra, not have fantasies about Scarlett Johanssen.) They said: Cleopatra is now far too deeply ingrained in our consciousness as Elizabeth Taylor in a bob, it will jar in a reader's imagination. A strange point, but a valid one. Cleopatra is now forever a brunette in the same way that Richard the Third will always be hunchbacked, thanks to Shakespeare.

Let’s look at the evidence, ladies and gentlemen of the jury. Exhibit A: there are few existing likenesses of the lady extant. A coin from the period shows her in profile, and it’s a pretty terrifying image too, not unlike Mike Tyson. Exhibit B: two extremely ambiguous accounts from her contemporaries; Plutarch was at pains to describe her 'pleasing personality'. Only Cassius Dio said she was beautiful; but did he say that because he had to?So the evidence either way is sketchy, at best.

So I have imagined her in the book as she may have looked; her mother, after all, could have been a Syrian princess (we don't know that for sure either) and Syrian women were, and are, noted for exceptional beauty. But I didn’t play on it; in the context of the story, as in history, it was her spirit not her looks that really mattered. The woman had wit, fire and ambition to burn. She also ruled Egypt. If you were Caesar or Mark Antony, what’s not to like?But one thing even minimal research can do is quickly dispense with some of the more outrageous myths about her. She was not the sexual virago of legend; she did not copulate with crocodiles, (it's dangerous) or with her slaves (beneath her dignity). In fact, it seems she only slept with two men all her life, and both of them were husbands. Well, not her husbands, admittedly - but in all fairness, she did marry them later.

Dying by an asp bite to the breast? For those of you are contemplating it, suicide by this means is not advised. The breast is basically fatty tissue. It would be best to find a vein – the wrist, for example - which she may well have done - although other forms of poison cannot be ruled out. And finally let me assure you - and the scholars are pretty much one hundred per cent on this one - that she did not have a bob and a beauty spot; and Mark Antony did not talk with a Welsh accent and have a drinking problem. The truth - as far that can ever be ascertained - is far more interesting, no matter how you read it. And choosing how to write it - that's the joy of being a writer.WHEN WE WERE GODS, is now available on Kindle at $5.99.

Thank you, Colin! To learn more about Colin Falconer and his work, please visit his website and his blog at http://www.colinfalconer.net/the-man-with-the-past.html

Guest post from Sarah Bryant, author of SERENDIPITY

I'm delighted to welcome Sarah Bryant, author of SERENDIPITY. I had the incredible good fortune to read and review Sarah's past novels Sand Daughter and The Other Eden; she's an amazing, diverse writer who doesn't stick to conventions, and her post will be of great interest to those who both write and read eclectically.

Please join me in welcoming Sarah Bryant!

“Where do you get your ideas?” is the most common question people ask me when I tell them that I’m a writer, and it’s the most difficult to answer. It’s not so much that I don’t know (although flash-in-the-pan inspiration is always a factor) but that the origins of my books are usually so distant, so mundane, or so apparently unrelated to the finished product, that people either don’t believe me, or are disillusioned by the banality of the truth.

Serendipity is no exception. Its point of origin is seventeen years ago, my second year of university, when I was a competitive dinghy sailor. I woke up one morning from a dream about an old white wooden sailboat wanting to write about it, about sailing’s addictive quality and (being a rose-tinted twenty year old) about love. The result was an abysmal short story about a girl who loved sailboats, and a boy who loved her, which languished in my “stories” folder until the following year, when my first real relationship broke up.

Among other fallout, I quit sailing. I had to, if I didn’t want to see the boy in question every day. I missed it at least as much as I missed him, but there was no question of going back to either one. So what to do with the sudden, gaping hole in my life? Write about it, of course! I dusted off the sailboat story, trashed most of it, but kept the two characters. Then I started listening. The guy was silent. But the girl, Meredith, had a lot to say about love and loss and disillusionment. I started writing. It wasn’t until the following summer that Meredith’s pages of rumination began to take shape as a novel. But it had nothing at all to do with Meredith, or even sailboats. I was working that summer on a small teaching farm – a nineteenth century holdover, marooned in the Massachusetts suburbs. Before I knew it, an imaginary world was forming around that farm, and out of it, unexpectedly, the silent man began to speak.

He was intelligent and wry and somehow damaged. I put Meredith aside, and started writing Silence. The more I wrote, though, the more I worried. There seemed to be no middle ground between the heartbroken sailing prodigy and the disillusioned farmer. The answer came out of left field, as writing answers so often seem to. My friend Adam, a fellow farm-worker, informed me one morning, “My new favourite word is ‘serendipity’. Serendipity explains everything.” I said, “Right, whatever,” but I found the word knocking around my head over the next few days as I demonstrated the joys of cow milking and composting to a lot of hot, bored suburban children. And then Adam took me to see his family’s farm – another fabulous bit of anachronistic Americana. It had a huge old red barn, bigger even than the house, and intriguingly empty. It was big enough to hold a boat. And that was it, the flash in the pan: Silence was building a boat in his barn! And sooner or later he was going to need help: enter Meredith. Serendipity, indeed.

I’d like to say it all went smoothly from there, but novels never do. I took Serendipity with me onto a masters program, where the tutor hated it, and did her level best to fail me. A year later, I was lucky enough to find an agent who loved it, and I thought I was sorted. Wrong again: the agent couldn’t sell it, and ultimately gave up on it. So did I.

I wrote other books, found publishers for them, realized that historical was my thing. Then something strange happened. I was bogged down writing what should have been my fourth novel, with two small children and too little time to do the research it required. As I slogged away at 19th century Edinburgh, though, two familiar voices started speaking to me. And they were saying, “When are you ever going to figure it out? Our story belongs here!”
So I took Serendipity back out, re-set the first section in the 1890s, re-read it. At long last, it all made perfect sense. I emailed my editor: “Um, about that book you’re expecting…is it okay if I write a completely different one?”

The rest, so to speak, is history.

Thank you, Sarah! We wish you much success! To find out more about Sarah and her work, please visit her website.

Historical Novel Society Conference 2011

Yesterday, at 7:34 p.m., I staggered home after a whirlwind weekend at the Historical Novel Society's 4th USA Conference, held in beautiful San Diego. What an event! For readers, writers, bloggers and anyone else who loves historical fiction, this was the place to be - two overstuffed days of panels, banquets, late-night sex scene readings, fight reenactments, and more chatter than a switchboard on meth.

I've attended two of the previous HNS conferences - Salt Lake City and Schaumburg - first as a self-published author seeking to sell my next manuscript and second as a first-time traditionally published novelist seeking to network. This time, I went as a speaker and as a writer, first and foremost, as well as to support my agent, Jennifer Weltz of the Jean V Naggar Literary Agency, and my St Martin's Press editor, Charlie Spicer. It's always great to socialize with people who work in publishing; unlike other jobs I've had, those in publishing by and large like to party. So, evidently, do historical fiction writers and aficionados. In between panels on everything from Fact vs Fiction to Are Marquee Names Necessary? the hotel facing the sparkling harbor crackled with energy and wine as writers exchanged ideas, business cards, advice, and stories. I would have had to stay five days to meet and talk to everyone I wanted to.

There were many memorable moments - Diana Gabaldon joyously reading a gay sex scene from her upcoming novel; C.C. Humphreys in blue velvet acting the role of the earl of Rochester in a risque enactment from Gillian Bagwell's Darling Strumpet; the generous advice and caution doled out by the editors during their panel; Kate Quinn's red leather stilettos; the lovely reader who brought me a postcard with a picture of a Catherine de Medici lily; gossiping with Allie of Hist-Fic Chick and Heather of Maiden's Court; Karleen Koen explaining how she gets around "inconvenient" facts - but it was Jennifer Weltz's rousing, all-encompassing keynote speech on building community that symbolized the entire nature of the occasion.

Community is what the Historical Novel Society is truly all about. There were no "stars" at this conference; rather, everyone was a star. From the unpublished writer pitching for the first time to an agent or editor; to the impossibly young and enthusiastic blogger to the veteran author with numerous titles under her belt, everyone was there to help, support, and encourage one another; to rally around a genre that in the past has suffered more than its share of denigration, and to rejoice in its current explosive popularity. Not that there weren't stars - oh, no! The roster was peppered with the brightest names in the business, jaw-droppingly so; but unlike other organizations, HNS has never been about celebrity or exclusiveness.

On the contrary. It's all about celebration.

The Historical Novel Society's next conference will be held in 2012 in London. I hope to see you there!

Guest Post from Evan Ostryzniuk, author of OF FAITH AND FIDELITY

OF FAITH AND FIDELITY: Geoffrey Hotspur and the War for St. Peter’s Throne is the first book in the English Free Company series set in the late Middle Ages, by Evan Ostryzniuk. The English Free Company is led by Geoffrey Hotspur, an orphan-squire and ward of the mighty Duke of Lancaster, whose driving ambition is to become a knight and serve a great lord. Of Faith and Fidelity takes place in 1394, at the height of the key to winning the throne of St. Peter was control of the Patrimonschism of the Western Church when the throne of St. Peter was contested by rival claimants in Rome and Avignon. Unable to settle the dispute peacefully, both sides resorted to war, and the y, a band of territory stretching the breadth of Italy that owes fealty to whichever pope who can rule it. Before Henry V won his miraculous victory at Agincourt, before the Borgias had done their infamous deeds, there was Geoffrey Hotspur, a man as tall as Charlemagne and armed with a sword that rivals Excalibur. Thrown off the established path to knighthood, the ambitious and hot-tempered Geoffrey finds himself caught up in the war between the two popes, where he must adapt his beliefs and apply his training as a squire in order to survive.

Please join me in welcoming Evan Ostryzniuk!

Imagining the setting one step at a time
by Evan Ostryzniuk
One of the most difficult tasks for the writer of historical novels is reconciling the fictional setting between what it looks like today, what you want it to be, and how contemporaries saw it. This acquires greater importance when spatial relations have to make key contributions to the plot. Because Of Faith and Fidelity features a number of castles, cities and battlefields, I had to make sure that I understood the physical relationships of urban and rural topographies if I was to offer a convincing portrayal of the challenges my characters face when negotiating them. If I can’t run up a set of stone steps to reach a parapet without huffing and puffing, then I cannot in good conscience have my man-at-arms, weighted down with a sword and armor, probably suffering from some sort of chronic ailment, racing aloft and confronting his opponent in full readiness, no matter how much his medieval adrenalin is pumping. Finding the logical range of action for a (non-superheroic) character is the duty of every historical fiction author.

Wandering around a medieval castle today can be a sullen experience because of how thoroughly so many of them have been hollowed out, leaving the author with a negative impression of castle life. At the northern Italian city of Marostica, which is famous for its chessboard main square, the medieval curtain walls and gatehouses survive intact, although they are worn and barren but for a small museum. At first glance, the fortifications look dull, and they are practically isolated from the town proper, as though today’s residents are embarrassed by them. If I were to transpose these initial impressions to the fictional page, I would be misrepresenting their true relationship with the objects of its protection. On close examination I found that the main gatehouse was full of holes – not from the impact of cannon fire, but rather from the insertion of timber. Studying how these mysterious apertures were aligned, I discovered that the beams that were once there must have supported extensive terraces of several levels that projected well into the city. These terraces, I assume, were rented by merchants, patrolled by sentries, and used by the town fathers for important announcements. Building on this knowledge, I imagined canopies, balconies, curtains, and all sorts of decoration that eventually adorned the naked walls with rich and dynamic structures. The fortifications not only protected Marostica – they were well integrated into the life of the great city.

All authors need to imagine their settings in great detail, of course, but the physical presence of him or her at these locations, regardless of changing uses and structural alterations, can do wonders for building that fictional environment, supporting its veracity, and offering opportunities for discoveries that deepen the narrative. It’s the little things that matter, and more to the point, the things that are left out by contemporaries. Cities are a major challenge in this regard. We live in an age of the metropolis, where everything – simply put – is bigger. On my tour of medieval Italy I was astounded by just how compact and isolated even the great cities were. Their former citizens must have felt this. Siena, for example, is a marvel of form and function, with an enormous cathedral, magnificent main square (which is round) and enough houses for the city to be divided into competing districts. It was one of the centers of banking and a stop along the great pilgrim route, yet at a casual pace I crossed the breadth of Siena in an hour! Even considering Siena’s modest urban sprawl, I can’t help but be convinced that the average medieval citizen felt dwarfed and isolated from the endless forests and fields that would have surrounded his or her city. As a writer of historical fiction, I feel compelled to emphasize this essential distance, for it affected contemporaries’ worldview, and from that how they interacted with city and country.

The author of historical fiction has to take especial care when reimagining battlefields because he or she has to consider so many factors and conditions. Few medieval battlefields are preserved in any meaningful sense, and contemporary chroniclers tended to focus on the deeds of great knights, unless the conditions had a critical impact on the battle, like the mud at Agincourt or the heat at Hattin. Every reader wonders what it must have been like to be laden with armor, packed in dense ranks and brandish a heavy weapon in the face of an enemy. I know what fascinates me is the intensity of the combat experience. Understanding strategy is fine, but what I want to know is how much did the men-at-arms sweat as he stood for hours on an open field, what kind of traction did he have, or how difficult it was for him to move in full harness. When I walked around the fields of Anghiari, I tested the resilience of the ground, hazarded the distance to the surrounding hills and the town itself, and I tried to create for myself the perspective of a Florentine foot soldier who might have stood in 1440 where I was standing in 2010, awaiting the charge of the Milanese on that fateful June day.

Evan Ostryzniuk was born and raised in western Canada, where he attended the University of Saskatchewan. After graduating with a B.A. in History and Modern Languages and an M.A. in Modern History, Evan did post-graduate work at the University of Cambridge, concluding five years of research with a doctoral thesis on the Russian Revolution. He eventually found his way to eastern Europe, where he took up positions as a magazine editor, university lecturer and analyst in the financial services sector before finally settling on writing as a career. He currently resides in Kyiv, Ukraine. Of Faith and Fidelity: Geoffrey Hotspur and the War for St. Peter’s Throne is his first novel.

TUDOR SECRET debuts in the UK and blogger giveaway

THE TUDOR SECRET debuts today in mass market paperback in the UK! The UK's mass-market is a larger-sized paperback than our US mass market editions, and it looks lovely. The book is also discounted at Waterstones and WH Smith. To all my UK readers, I hope you enjoy it and thank you for your support!

In honor of the book's release, I'm offering TWO free copies to UK-based bloggers for review. If you are a UK-based blogger and would like to review The Tudor Secret on your blog, please leave me a comment below. Giveaway ends June 20.

For the love of a feral cat

Yesterday evening, my partner and I lost our oldest cat, Rosie, unexpectedly. She'd been sitting on the low wood fence between our house and our neighbor's, as she did almost every night after dinner. We had checked on her earlier in the evening from our living room window before settling down for a movie, and she eyed us with her usual nonchalance. Half way through the film, we heard a loud scuffle; our dog Paris started barking in agitation and throwing herself at the door. We ran outside. A pitbull-mix dog that lived a few doors down and we always worried about had evidently gotten loose and came upon her. Rosie was half-blind in one eye and her hearing had diminished significantly; she had sat on that fence every night for years and either didn't see the dog or didn't think it posed a danger, until it was too late. Though we ran out and fought it off, stopping it from mauling her to death, her back leg had sustained severe injuries. It would have required amputation and difficult follow-up. So, at 1:45 a.m., in the emergency hospital, as we petted her and murmured our love, she was euthanized. She'd already been heavily sedated, and she left us quietly, without further pain.

It was the first time in 11 years we had touched her.

Like our other five cats, who depend on us for food, care, and shelter in our garden and in our garage, where we've designed a cat-friendly environment, Rosie was feral. We think she was probably 11 or 12 years old; but we were never sure. She came to us as a young cat, hungry, thin, and wary, as so many cats born outside do. Together with our next door neighbors, both of whom love cats, we gained her trust and respected the boundaries she determined for interaction. In time, she was caught and spayed, but she was never tamed. Still, she stayed. She dwelled in our and our neighbors' gardens and accepted the other ferals who drifted into our lives over the years and were likewise neutered or spayed, and released; she and they even developed a hierarchy. When feeding time came and Rosie was there, the other cats always deferred to her. She ate first. Same when it came to the wheelbarrow in the garden; it was her special daytime sleeping spot and woe was any other cat who tried to take it from her. She even developed a relationship of sorts with Paris; our dog didn't chase her and she deigned to tolerate Paris sharing the garden on occasion.

Rosie was a wanderer, at first. We fretted over her days-long disappearances, only for her to suddenly show up at our kitchen door, face pressed to the glass, wanting food. As she aged, she stopped leaving. In the last 8 years, she never went far. She ate every day in the morning and evening (and, as her chewing abilities decreased, had her own special dish of wet food); took her morning groom on our deck, her afternoon nap in the wheelbarrow, and at night . . . well, she went onto the fence, to watch the traffic or bask in the moonlight and whatever other allure the night holds for cats.

Her loss - both for how it happened and that it happened to her - has left us bereft. However when I mentioned to a well-meaning friend that we'd decided to have her privately cremated and her ashes returned to us, this friend said, "But why? I mean, it's not as if she was your pet. She was just a wild cat you fed." This got me to thinking about the complex, sometimes intangible bond we can develop with animals, particularly feral cats. People who don't care for them cannot understand that while we may not touch these cats, curl up with them in our beds or play with them, they are still an integral part of our family. We saw Rosie every day for all those years; we watched over her, ensured she would be as safe and comfortable as possible, and always respected she was not, and would never be, a fully domesticated cat. This doesn't mean we didn't love her or she didn't love us. I saw it in her eyes, sometimes, when I paused to whisper silly things at her as I set down her food or went to clean her box in the garage. She would tilt her head, regarding me with those big amber eyes, and she would narrow her gaze, as if to tell me, she understood. She understood and she appreciated it. She thanked us.

We already miss Rosie terribly. We find ourselves looking out the window for her, toward the now-empty wheelbarrow which for today at least, none of the other cats have claimed. Tonight, when we went down into the garden to feed them, all five were sitting there, waiting. They rarely show up like that, all at once; they tend to feed in shifts. Yet as my partner and I gazed upon their solemn faces, they returned our look and I could have sworn, they knew. They realized Rosie was gone and we were grieving for her.

And in their silent way, they thanked us.

CONFESSIONS OF CATHERINE DE MEDICI in trade paperback!

The trade paperback edition of THE CONFESSIONS OF CATHERINE DE MEDICI is in stores tomorrow, with a gorgeous new cover and bonus reader material!

I'll be on tour most of June. My first tour with Historical Fiction Virtual Tours starts tomorrow and ends June 6; you can follow my schedule here.

My second tour with Pump Up Your Book Promotion starts on June 13 and ends on June 24; the schedule is here.

In addition, I'll be appearing at the Historical Novel Society Conference in San Diego, June 17 - 19. To find out more about this one-of-a-kind gathering of the tribe, click here.

For my UK-based readers, the mass market paperback edition of THE TUDOR SECRET, hits stores on June 9. The new edition is beautiful, with a slightly re-designed cover. I'm excited about it and hope my UK readers enjoy the book!

As you can see, I'm going to be busy, so this blog may be quiet for a while. In the past, I've posted my daily tour appearances here, as they happen, but this time, they'll be posted on my Facebook page instead, so as to not clutter up this blog's feed. If you want to follow along, please do so at Facebook.

Thanks for all your support, as always. I hope to be back soon with more exciting author interviews, giveaways, and news!

Blogger Review Opportunity for CONFESSIONS OF CATHERINE DE MEDICI

THE CONFESSIONS OF CATHERINE DE MEDICI releases on May 24 in trade paperback in the U.S. (Random House Readers Circle edition). I currently have two virtual tours scheduled, the first one with Historical Fiction Virtual Tours on May 24 through June 4 and then with Pump Up Your Book Promotion on June 13 through June 24. As always, I'll be offering guest posts and giveaways.

I have a few extra copies for US-only bloggers who would like to feature and review the book. If you have not signed for one of my tours and are interested in reviewing the book on your blog, please send an e-mail at cwgortner [at] earthlink.net and I'll do my best to accomodate your request. Thank you in advance for all your support!

Guest post from Paul Elwork, author of THE GIRL WHO WOULD SPEAK FOR THE DEAD

I'm delighted to welcome Paul Elwork, author of THE GIRL WHO WOULD SPEAK FOR THE DEAD, a debut novel set in 1925 and based on the powerful spiritualist revival of that era. Thirteen year old Emily Stewart and her brother Michael gather the neighborhood children to fool them with “spirit knockings.” But soon their game of contacting the dead creeps into a world of adults still reeling from the after effects of World War I. When the twins find themselves dabbling in the uncertain territory of human grief and family secrets, their game spins wildly out of control. A layered, multigenerational story, The Girl Who Would Speak for the Dead is a novel about our desperate need to contact the departed, and what we ultimately will do for forgiveness.

Please join me in welcoming Paul Elwork!

Historical Accuracy and the Make-Believe of Fiction
Historical reality is a funny thing in fiction. To begin with, being fiction, it’s not supposed to faithfully replicate reality, but to reinvent, recombine, and recast it. Fiction writers should try to infuse their make-believe stories (whether set in realistic, familiar settings or in places where dragons fly) with larger truth as they best understand it. Truth about the experience of being human, about what it means to exist in the divided and complicated consciousness of an entity we call a person, conducted through all of the filters and personal history of a writer typing or scribbling away. But of course we’re playing with the materials to serve our stories, and I fail to see why we can’t play with history if it’s considered proper for us to make up people who were never born.

Okay, as far as that goes, but how much playing with historical reality is acceptable in fiction? And just for a second, let’s consider the whole notion of “historical fiction.” When we use this term, are we referring strictly to a genre with an internal logic and expectations imposed by both writers and readers? My novel, The Girl Who Would Speak for the Dead (Amy Einhorn Books/Penguin Group), is set in the 1920s, but I wouldn’t place it in any specific genre, including historical fiction. I think genre labels have a limited value for broad sorting purposes, but that as readers we should ditch them when approaching any piece of fiction and its performance on the page. This is not anti-genre snobbery; it’s anti-anti-genre snobbery. I say rejoice when we find literary value, whatever the style or setting.

Obviously, the questions above invoke all sorts of eye-of-the-beholder responses, and I have no interest in arguing for any specific metrics on the matter. Just like any other aspect of a novel, adherence to historical accuracy or lack of it is something for each reader to take or leave, to buy into or set aside. Still, I’m sort of fascinated by the kind of reader who demands a strict fidelity to historical facts in works of fiction. (A further complication is that such facts are often not as set in stone as the word implies, but never mind that.) They seem to treat any departure from historical accuracy as a kind of writer offense, something like the questions about truthfulness that seem to follow the megasuccess of memoirs in publishing just now. All of this is not to say that I don’t respect writers who do endless research to best capture moments and places in time. Even though my novel isn’t a slice of life taken from urban Philadelphia in the 1920s, even though the action takes place on the outskirts and in a much more insular place, I still did careful research to set my characters on a stage corresponding with history as best I could—except for one omission, as I explain below.

When my novel was released in an earlier edition by a small press a few years ago, I had an encounter with a strict-history reader on the night of my first public appearance as a writer, at a branch of the Free Library of Philadelphia. The book—in its old form and new, expanded version—is about a twin brother and sister who pretend to contact the dead during the summer of 1925. Emily Stewart, the sister in this set of twins, makes a cracking noise with her ankle that she and her brother Michael convince others are the sounds of the departed knocking from the other side. The book takes place in 1925 and draws much of its thematic energy from being in the shadow of World War I, but it plays with history in borrowing the true story of the Fox sisters of upstate New York, who did the same thing, with a different scope and outcomes, in the mid-nineteenth century. There’s even an author’s note in the beginning of the book acknowledging all of this: Anyone familiar with the birth of the Spiritualist movement in the mid-nineteenth century will recognize the story of the Fox sisters as the inspiration of this novel. And anyone who recognizes the Fox sisters floating behind the narrative will also see the flaw in the novel’s attempt to mimic historical reality (such as it is)—namely, that the occult-minded people in this book, who would certainly be familiar with the sisters from upstate New York, treat the Stewart twins as a new and exciting phenomenon. For this indiscretion, I ask the reader’s forgiveness and a suspension of disbelief. History suggested the novel’s basis and theme; its specific events and characters are the responsibility of my own imagination.

At my first public reading, the person determined to depants me on this point was a former editor of a well-known magazine of fantasy and horror fiction. He raised his hand and proceeded, like a lawyer for the prosecution, to scornfully outline his problem with my novel’s premise. I acknowledged that he was right about the chronological rearrangement, mentioned the author’s note, but he wasn’t impressed. He had raised his hand to expose me as an ignorant charlatan and he wasn’t going to hit the brakes at that point.

I could have said so many withering things, but I didn’t. A voice in my head said I shouldn’t eviscerate this guy at my first public appearance, even if most of the attendees were the students of a friend’s high-school class. It still tickles me that a man who had invested himself for years as an editor and writer in fantasy and science fiction would take such an unflinching, orthodox stance on historical accuracy. I tried to move on, having let him have his say and answered him. He wasn’t going to let go. He started making suggestions that I should have set the story before the advent of radio, to make it plausible that this little neighborhood had no knowledge of such stuff, because in the 1920s they would have heard about Harry Houdini running around debunking the early-twentieth-century inheritors of the Fox sisters’ act.
The editor’s wife tried to be helpful. She asked—with a hopeful note in her voice—if the book was a work of alternative history. I told her I don’t think in terms of genre when I write. She really was trying to be nice, and I still appreciate it.

By this point, I was responding to her husband in somewhat condescending tones. I’m only human. I explained that I wasn’t trying to mince around the Fox sisters as a historical issue in my novel. I was simply removing them from the equation, something I thought wouldn’t be such a big deal, considering that most people aren’t familiar with the first Spiritualists, anyway. And even at that, I felt it was worth mentioning in a note before the story begins, to acknowledge the inspirational source of the novel and free me to fictionalize at will. I would have been less comfortable writing a story set in the 1920s that removed World War I from the equation, so I guess my personal line lies somewhere between the historical displacement of removing the Fox sisters and removing the first full-scale industrial war of the modern age. Is that line stark, for me? Would I stand up before a writer who crossed it to huff and puff like the editor I’m having fun with here, even if that writer did so knowingly to serve his or her purposes as a storyteller?
No. I’d be bound by my own answer for the editor in the crowd, who protested me saying I had written about a world that had never known the Fox sisters. He said, “You can’t do that.”
I said, “Of course I can. I can do anything I want. It’s a novel.”
He raised his eyebrows and suddenly, finally, dropped it. I think that little line got more traction with him than my author’s note ever could.

Thank you, Paul. We wish you the best of luck with the novel! Paul lives in Philadelphia and is the father of two sons. His work has appeared in a variety of journals, including Philadelphia Stories, Short Story America, SmokeLong Quarterly, and Word Riot. His novel The Girl Who Would Speak for the Dead (Amy Einhorn Books/Penguin Group) is available online and in bookstores everywhere. For more information, please visit his website.