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Monthly Archives: June 2010

PART II

Keeping characters straight through a number of books is hard. But in the end, each story must stand on its own, its hero and heroine bound together by a unique, sigh-worthy, compelling love. Always, there are aspects of personality that make the trail to that happy ending more difficult. For each story, let’s find out which traits advanced and which complicated that journey.

Strengths and flaws of your hero and heroine:

From Louise Allen:

My two heroes are brothers – Marcus (Book 1) and Hal Carlow (Book 7)– and they appear, on the surface, to be very different. Marcus is serious and responsible and very conscious of his duty to the family whereas Hal is a complete rakehell and only serious about his duty as an army officer. But get them together and they both reveal hidden sides to their characters. Marcus is actually as physically courageous and reckless as Hal, whereas Hal, at the first sign of a threat, is as protective of his family as his elder brother.

I did fall for Marcus’s almost constant frown – a deep groove between his brows. His family is enough to make any man frown, and it takes a while for Nell Latham to see that deep groove as a symbol of his caring and not bad temper. As for Hal, I love the fact that under his appearance of hard-bitten soldier and heartless rake he is actually putty in the hands of small children.

Nell Latham, the heroine of the first book, appears supremely competent and has managed to support herself by her skill as a milliner in a very hard world. But I was amused to discover her areas of incompetence – especially her almost lethal approach to firearms.

As for Julia Tresilian, Hal’s heroine, my favourite thing about her is the rebellion that is hidden beneath the well-behaved façade. Julia is all that is dutiful – which is probably why, when she decides to behave completely outrageously, her poor mama hasn’t got a clue what is going on until it is too late to do anything about it.

As for flaws, Marcus has to learn to go with his instincts and his heart and to discover that sometimes trust is more important than doing what is apparently the right thing. Hal has to stop believing in his own image and discover that under the rake who lives for fighting and for pleasure without commitment there is actually a serious and sensitive man who wants to love and be faithful.

Nell’s great flaw – although she would never admit it – is pride. She’ll starve in her garret rather than accept help from a man she sees as an enemy and when her hand is forced she will be reckless rather than ask for help.

Julia suffers from a lack of self-confidence. She believes that she must compromise over marriage and accept any man who will have her. Fortunately Hal manages – unwittingly? – to sabotage every dull and eligible suitor’s courtship. Even then, it takes a lot before she can believe she is loved.

From Christine Merrill:

I just finished reading Louise Allen’s The Lord and the Wayward Lady, and was pleasantly surprised to find my heroine Diana Price ice skating in it. But I could totally believe that she would. Diana is a practical girl who, when she shows up in my book, is given to healthy exercise and walking in the park. She is moderation in all things, until she meets Nathan Wardale.

Nathan’s best quality is probably his steadfast nature. He can survive just about anything that life throws at him in the way of physical hardship, and come away stronger for it. There isn’t really anything that can scare him. The only weakness he has left is for Diana Price.

Considering what happens in the rest of the books, Stephano Beshaley can be a bit hard to love. But when not being an avatar of vengeance, he’s a jewel merchant with a safe full of precious stones and is looking for the right girl to wear them.

My favorite thing about Verity Carlow is probably her sense of adventure. By the time we get to book eight, she’s been sheltered from the action of the whole series. But I kidnap her (twice) and take her to a Gypsy camp and a brothel. I’d hesitate to say she enjoys it, but she proves very resilient.

From Julia Justiss:

For my heroine Lady Honoria, it’s her gritty resilience. With the ruin of her reputation, she’s lost everything a well-bred virgin considered important: her position as the most courted Diamond of the Ton, the admiration and envy of women and the adulation of men, the certainty of making a brilliant marriage that will maintain her position in society. Rather than shut herself away, railing against the unfairness of fate, she takes a hard look at who she is and who she can be, despite her loss of status. She begins to appreciate the considerable resources that remain to her and what she can do with them for the people around her.

Gabe Hawksworth, hellion black sheep and despair of his very proper family, has racketed around life, finding satisfaction only in his army service. Becoming temporary captain of a smuggling vessel for the army friend who saved his life is just the latest in his adventures. Initially, he is only intrigued by–and hopeful of seducing–the mysterious young lady who appears in Cornwall. But as he comes to know her, indignation over the outrage perpetrated against her and determination to right the wrong show him the path to a future he could never have envisioned.

For flaws, Honoria has to learn to control the impulsive recklessness that permitted an unscrupulous person to ruin her and figure out how to channel her courage and determination to a higher cause. Gabe has to realize that pledging yourself to one special person is more liberating than adventuring through life without ties or family.

From Gayle Wilson:

I have a history of creating very flawed characters, but Rhys Morgan and Nadya Argentari are, perhaps, exceptions to that rule. Rhys suffers from physical injuries sustained during the Peninsula Campaign, but seems undamaged emotionally by the brutality he witnessed there. His burning desire is to extend his service to his country, a hope that precipitates the journey on which he encounters the beautiful Romany healer. Nadya is a practical and rational woman, a valued member of her family group, secure in her role there and very happy with her life. Their physical attraction takes them by surprise, and both acknowledge the impossibility of any relationship between them. Rhys’s desire to protect Nadya from an unknown enemy, however, forces them into an ever-closer intimacy. The flaw that leads to the climax of the novel is not found in these characters, but rather in the prejudices of the societies in which they live, prejudices they must overcome to find a lasting happiness.

From Annie Burrows:

I got a real buzz when my editor admitted she was just a little bit in love with Monty. And Louise Allen’s comment, after reading my story (which she got in a special offer bundle from Mills & Boon) that she thought Midge was an original absolutely made my day.

Greatest flaws – ok, both my main characters have plenty. Midge has no confidence in herself as a woman. In fact, because of her mother’s obsession with her sons, she finds it hard to believe in her worth as a person at all.

And as for Monty – well, his own childhood was not much better than Midge’s. He has experienced deep hurts and rejections, which have left him determined never to appear as though he needs anyone. Least of all a woman.

So neither is quite sure what to make of it when they can’t keep their hands off each other. It would not take much for them to make a complete hash of their relationship.

Which is just the point where Stephano steps in…

From Margaret McPhee:

Thief-taker Will Wolversley, or Wolf, as he is known, is definitely a man I would fall for, but then I’ve always had a soft spot for bad boys and outsiders.

What I like best about Wolf is that as mean, moody and dangerous as he is to the world at large, when it comes to the woman he loves it’s a completely different story.

As for my heroine, lady’s companion Miss Rosalind Meadowfield, what I like about her is her warm heart, her gentleness and, most of all, her ability to see through Wolf’s tough exterior.

Their greatest flaws? Wolf’s prejudice against the aristocracy, the gentry and women like Rosalind Meadowfield.

And Rosalind’s determination to run away from the sensual attraction that exists between her and the big bad thief-taker.

Today at the Riskies we welcome not one but six Harlequin Historicals authors to talk about their new miniseries “Regency Silk & Scandal”! They have so much to say on the creation of these books that they’ll be with us two days, today and tomorrow, and they’ll be giving away some great prizes–two copies of The Lord and the Wayward Lady and one early copy of The Smuggler and the Society Bride

MURDER…SCANDAL…REVENGE? WHY, IT’S REGENCY SILK & SCANDAL!

Three friends and rival spymasters, two scandalous affairs, one murder, and an innocent man hanged on the testimony of his best friend set the stage for the next generation to try to solve the mystery of the murder and redeem lives shattered by disgrace.

Series, miniseries, continuities…by whatever name, these linked stories are perennially popular with readers.Those not written by a single author, however, are generally contemporaries and generally created by an editorial team who determine an overall story arc, individual plots and continuing characters, then contract authors to write the designated stories.

The REGENCY SILK & SCANDAL miniseries, which began this month from Harlequin Historical/Mills & Boon with Louise Allen’s THE LORD AND THE WAYWARD LADY, is quite different. First, the stories are set in Regency rather than modern times. Instead of having editors predetermine the significant factors, the six-author team was given free rein to develop the story arc, invent the recurring characters and determine the plot for each of the eight books, then each author picked which story she wanted to write.

The creation of SILK & SCANDAL was an adventure that lead to a Yahoo group currently clocked in at over 3000 e-mails, spreadsheets presenting family trees, detailed timelines, and a “bible” created and maintained by author Annie Burrows that logged weekly all the significant facts developed about the recurring characters as the authors simultaneously wrote their stories.

With six authors, even simple replies get lengthy, so we’re dividing this post into two segments. Today, the authors will talk about the process of writing the continuity; tomorrow’s post will focus on how they developed characters when some were members of the miniseries families and some were not.

Part 1: What were the best and worst things about writing this continuity?

Louise Allen, author of Book 1, THE LORD AND THE WAYWARD LADY and Book 7, THE OFFICER AND THE PROPER LADY:
The opportunity to help create something on a much wider canvas than usual was the first positive that struck me – and despite the difficulty of trying to keep it all straight, that remained enormously satisfying.

What was a worry at first, and then rapidly turned into an absolute joy, was getting to know the other continuistas. The stimulus of working with five other very creative writers, all with a different style and approach and yet all willing to work together to a common end was great and it is such a satisfying way to acquire five wonderful new friends.

The worst thing was realising I was writing the first book and the terror – usually at 3am – that I wouldn’t get this off to a coherent, let alone readable, start. It did get less worrying as time went on though!

Then there was the anxiety that I had done something that would have an effect on other books in the continuity – perhaps developing a character, who was minor in my stories but major in someone else’s, in the wrong direction and not realising this would create a problem that would have serious consequences later on. This didn’t happen, thank goodness, because we all tried very hard to keep checking and Annie Burrows kept a vast file of every email decision or comment.

Christine Merrill, author of Book 2, PAYING THE VIRGIN’S PRICE and Book 8, TAKEN BY THE WICKED RAKE:
This will be tricky, because it sounds like shameless pandering to say that there was no “worst thing.” Unless I count the absolute terror I felt at the beginning, when we didn’t know each other, and had absolutely nothing to start with. I felt pretty dry of ideas at that point, and very intimidated to be working in such a talented group.

But the worst thing turned out to be the best thing, when I began to enjoy the freedom of it, and the creative rush of new ideas, as the story started to develop. By that time, we weren’t strangers any more. More like a tight knit group of friends. Then it became more like playing than working.

Julia Justiss, author of Book 3, THE SMUGGLER AND THE SOCIETY BRIDE:
For The Best, What Louise and Chris Said! With the scope of eight books, we wanted to write about a wide variety of characters, and so came up with the idea of three aristocratic families rocked by a scandal that sees one family remain at the top of the ton, members of a second slip down into the middle reaches, and those of the third, whose father is convicted of treason, cast out altogether and scattered to the four winds. So among our heroes and heroines we have viscounts and governesses, paid companions and thief-takers, Diamonds of the Ton and milliners.

My greatest hope? That the series will do well enough that the editors will consider commissioning other projects like this in future.

The absolute best? Having five other authors with whom to brainstorm, revise and commiserate!

The worst? Worrying that I wouldn’t finish on time, or that my book wouldn’t rise to the high standard of the others.

From Gayle Wilson, author of Book 4, CLAIMING THE FORBIDDEN BRIDE:
The most difficult thing for me in writing was plunging back into the Regency world after six years of exclusively writing romantic suspense. Although early in my career I easily switched back and forth between these two disparate genres, I hadn’t done that in quite a while. Knowing how knowledgeable Regency readers are, I was also apprehensive that I might make some glaring historical error or not be able to find my “Regency voice” again.

As it turned out, those fears were allayed somewhat by the discovery that I would be writing with a group of Regency pros who were more than willing to share both their expertise and their resources.I’m sure I made some of those period mistakes I had dreaded, but if so, that was only because I didn’t ask my fellow authors the right questions. Their creative generosity, their endless patience, their enthusiasm for this project, and their friendship was, in the end, the very best part of this experience for me.

From Annie Burrows, author of Book 5, THE VISCOUNT AND THE VIRGIN:
I hate to sound unoriginal, but the best thing was, without doubt, getting to know the other authors. At first I felt a bit shy about working alongside writers whose books I have on my shelves. But they were all so open and friendly that I soon began to look forward to logging into my inbox each day, and bouncing ideas around with them all.

Worst thing? The sheer volume of work required. We all had to keep the plots, characters, and timings of seven other stories clear in our heads whilst creating our own individual stories, with no editorial “bible”to guide us.

Before long, I started to record joint decisions as we made them, so I could keep things straight in my head. And before much longer, someone else owned up to having trouble remembering exactly what we’d agreed, after all the to-ing and fro-ing of ideas that went on, so I volunteered to upload the weekly progress to a file in our Yahoo group. There went my Friday nights.

From Margaret McPhee, author of Book 6, UNLACING THE INNOCENT MISS:
The best was the experience of working with the other continuistas; it was both interesting and inspirational to discover the ways other authors work. I’ve really learned so much from these lovely and generous ladies.

The worst was, like Julia, the two-fold worry that: I wouldn’t finish on time and b) my book wouldn’t meet the series’ high standard.

Stay tuned tomorrow for Part II of our interview!

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It should surprise no-one that my first introduction to the concept of Waterloo was from Abba:

My my, at Waterloo Napoleon did surrender
Oh yeah, and I have met my destiny in quite a similar way
The history book on the shelf
Is always repeating itself

Waterloo – I was defeated, you won the war
Waterloo – promise to love you for ever more
Waterloo – couldn’t escape if I wanted to
Waterloo – knowing my fate is to be with you
Waterloo – finally facing my Waterloo

My my, I tried to hold you back but you were stronger
Oh yeah, and now it seems my only chance is giving up the fight
And how could I ever refuse
I feel like I win when I lose

Waterloo – I was defeated, you won the war
Waterloo – promise to love you for ever more
Waterloo – couldn’t escape if I wanted to
Waterloo – knowing my fate is to be with you

And how could I ever refuse
I feel like I win when I lose

Waterloo – I was defeated, you won the war
Waterloo – promise to love you for ever more
Waterloo – couldn’t escape if I wanted to
Waterloo – knowing my fate is to be with you
Waterloo – finally facing my Waterloo

The extended etymological sense of “a final, crushing defeat” was first referenced in an 1816 letter of Lord Byron. And yes, it was a final, crushing defeat, but as Janet so eloquently posted yesterday, one in four soldiers died.

Meeting one’s Waterloo is something to be avoided. I’ve had a few near misses, but thus far have dodged any final, crushing defeats (although temporary ones are in abundance).

In books, the potential ‘final, crushing defeat’ is what is more normally called the Black Moment–that time in the book when neither the author nor the reader sees a possible way out of the situation that won’t result in misery, loss of love, loss of life, or eternal heartbreak. What makes our books so revelatory is that we do always find a way out, a way to vanquish that defeat with love, or a compromise, or a sacrifice. Literary fiction doesn’t always give us the Happy Ending, at least not the unabashed Happy Ending; romantic fiction does, thank goodness, so we can see hope amidst the fighting.

Have you ever had your own Waterloo? What happened? Are you a fan of the ‘gasp, clutch your chest and wonder how they’ll get out of it’ books, like I am? Who’s your favorite Black Moment author?

Megan

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It’s the eve of the Battle of Waterloo and we Riskies have been discussing offlist whether we should the battle again or not. The topic is both finite and infinite; there is so much material but for me it comes down to one fact that I wrote about here a couple of years ago here

Today I’m talking about the ordinary soldiers, the kids who signed up for the king’s shilling out of patriotism, were fooled by unscrupulous recruiters, or because they had so few options … One in four soldiers died that June day in 1815. Read more

Forget the ball and the Duke of Wellington and Napoleon and the dashing uniforms. One in four.

And that got me thinking about how we distill and sort historical information as writers and readers. What does the Regency represent to us?

For instance it’s a period of fashion and elegance, fabulous clothes, gorgeous architecture and interior design. Yet the simplicity and gorgeous drape we associate with gowns of the period really belongs to an earlier era, well before the Regency proper (1811-1820), as does most of the classic Georgian architecture. Consider the evolution of fashion from this 1795 gown (right) to the fussiness of the 1822 one (left).

We also associate the period with a certain amount of freedom and glamor and the Romantics–except by the 18-teens it wasn’t a great time to be a poet, particularly a poet of radical leanings. Shelley and Byron fled the country, but more because of their scandalous personal lives than their writing (except their lives and writing and political beliefs were bound together).

Their friend Leigh Hunt, journalist and co-founder of the Examiner, a periodical that mixed radical politics and the arts, was imprisoned for two years in 1813 for saying rude, if true, things about Prinny.

In addition, Lord Liverpool’s government passed some extraordinarily repressive legislation cutting down on civil liberties as a result of the uproar that followed the 1819 Peterloo Massacre, when local militia cut down a peaceful demonstration in Manchester. As a sidenote, the city is seeking a more permanent tribute on the site, as reported by the Guardian:

One of the lasting memorials of Peterloo crosses the former site of St Peter’s Fields daily, tucked under the arms of passers-by or downloaded to their computers and iPods.

It is the Guardian itself, which was founded by a group of moderate Manchester reformers as a direct result of the massacre, when it became clear that demonstrations and direct action were not going to change the government’s mind on widening the vote.

The government’s reaction was to pass legislation in addition to the suspension of Habeas Corpus, the Six Acts of 1819:

  • Training Prevention Act or Unlawful Drilling limited any sort of military training to local jurisdictions, punishable by transportation.
  • Seizure of Arms Act gave local magistrates the authority to search any private property for weapons and to arrest the owners.
  • Misdemeanors Act reduced opportunities for bail and allowed for speedier court processing.
  • Seditious Meetings Prevention Act made meetings of fifty or more people illegal unless authorized by a sheriff or magistrate.
  • Blasphemous and Seditious Libels Act. If Hunt had libeled Prinny in 1819 he could have been sentenced to fourteen years transportation.
  • Newspaper and Stamp Duties Act imposed taxes on publications that published opinion in addition to those that published news, and publishers were required to post a bond for their behavior.

Yikes. Not exactly the land of the free.

How do you reconcile the historical truth with the fantasy when you’re reading or writing?

I’m blogging today at Supernatural Underground and giving away ARCs of Jane and the Damned as prizes, and there’s a Damned Good Contest on my site, plus various excerpts etc. Check it out!

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