Category: Former Riskies

Happy Release Day To Me! (Contest!)

Updated on November 17, 2022 by carolyn

Interview with The Amazing, Astounding, and Always Humble Author Carolyn Jewel

Join us in a big Riskies Welcome to author Carolyn Jewel. Her historical romance, Not Wicked Enough, is out now. You should rush out and buy a copy. Also copies for all your friends and neighbors. The dog might like a copy. In fact, you’ll probably need several for the dog. (HOURS when your pet is not chewing on your furniture!)
You’ll be thought of as a hero or heroine for doing this, no costume required! But you could wear one if you want. (Please send pics.)

Q: Tell us about yourself, Carolyn

A: Carolyn Jewel was born on a moonless night. That darkness was seared into her soul and she became an award winning author of historical and paranormal romance. She has a very dusty car and a Master’s degree in English that proves useful at the oddest times. An avid fan of fine chocolate, finer heroines, Bollywood films, and heroism in all forms, she has three cats and a dog. Also a son. One of the cats is his.

Q: Tell us About Your Book

A: When Lily Wellstone heads to the Bitterward Estate to comfort her widowed friend Eugenia, she certainly does not have romance in mind. In fact the playful but level-headed Lily is amused to no end when, en route, a gypsy gifts her with a beautiful medallion, claiming it will ensnare the romantic desires of a stranger.

But Fate has other plans in the form of Eugenia’s ruggedly handsome brother, the Duke of Mountjoy. One day at Bitterward and Lily can’t deny the sizzling attraction between her and the roguish duke. Nothing can come of it, of course. She’s not looking for entanglements and he’s practically engaged. But whether it’s her outgoing nature and the duke’s outlandish ways sparking off one another; or the mysterious gypsy medallion working “magic”—hearts are stirring in the most unexpected and wicked ways…

Q: Are you really Carolyn Jewel? Because I heard she’s shy and never does interviews.

A: Yes, I am Carolyn. You can be assured it’s true because I spell my last name correctly. It’s true I’m shy. Like most writers, I’m hard to spot in the wild unless you know what you’re looking for. I was tricked into coming here.

Q: I beg your pardon?

Oh, come on. Like you don’t know what happens.

Certain people will stand on a corner and say, in a deliberately loud voice, “I HATE this book!” And then they throw a book on the ground. Every writer within a three mile radius will converge on that location to see what book was so despised as to elicit that sort of reaction. At that point, it’s pretty easy to capture an author because they’re an emotional lot and they’re crying and in shock.

A more dangerous tactic is to stand outside a stationer’s or bookstore and yell “Free Moleskines!” As you can imagine, the danger of getting trampled is quite high. Sure, you can capture several authors with this method, but I don’t feel it’s a risk anyone should take.

Q: How were you captured?

A: It was the Moleskine trick. I really need a new one. Mine is almost full. That lady didn’t look like a liar.

Q: Let’s talk about the darkness seared into your soul.

A: It’s contagious.

Q: So. What’s your favorite scene in Not Wicked Enough?

A: It was the moonless night, really. A LOT of authors are born on moonless nights. You’d be surprised. We’re a bit sensitive because of that. I know, I know, everyone’s heard there’s one who was born in the afternoon on a sunny day, but honestly, how likely is that? It’s one of those urban myths. Check your spam. I bet you have a chain email with some sappy story about the writer born on a sunny day (It was NOT Stephen King!). Please, don’t forward it, okay? Anyway, if we’re not born on a moonless night, then it’s a rainy one, which is almost the same thing, or else we grew up in a labyrinth. Sometimes a literal one.

Q: So. What’s your favorite scene in Not Wicked Enough?

A: Why are you asking me to chose? It’s like asking me which of my children I love the best.

Q: Don’t you writer-types kill your darlings?

Silence

Q: Well?

A: Is that a Molskine?

hand slapping sound

Q: Back off or I’m tearing a page out of the middle.

:::GASP:::

What’s your favorite scene in Not Wicked Enough?

A: Fine. I like the scene when Lily takes off all her clothes on a dare. But I’m not saying that’s my favorite.

Q: Did that really happen?

A: I’m a writer. If I say it happened. It happened. In Chapter 17.

Q: Tell us about the series, Reforming the Scoundrels.

A: Not Wicked Enough is the first book in a series that will be loosely linked by a locket reputed to have magical properties, in that it unites the wearer with his or her perfect love. The second book is Not Proper Enough. It’s kind of dirty.

Q: Really? How Dirty?

A: Super dirty. So far. I just turned it in so who knows what stays. Of course, Not Wicked Enough is also dirty. I was telling the truth about Chapter 17.

Q: What’s Next for You?

A: Well, Not Proper Enough will be out in September 2012, that’s the book following Not Wicked Enough.

I’m doing a self-published historical romance anthology with NYT bestselling authors Courtney Milan and Sherry Thomas. The title of the anthology is Midnight Scandals, and it should be out in June or July of this year.

By the end of this month, I should have a My Immortals series novella available (self-published) which is a much expanded version of the short story Future Tense, with the sex scenes restored. I call it Future Tense, the Uncensored Version. It’s totally hot and also kind of dirty. I’m just waiting for some final editing on that.

My next project is a My Immortals novel. It will be about Harsh Marit and in that book I will be channeling my love of Arjun Rampal.

Q: What’s the giveaway?

A: You want me to give away your secret identity?

Q: No. If you do that, you won’t get any more cookies.

A: I’m giving away five copies of Not Wicked Enough with the expectation that the winners will do a review of the book in return. An HONEST review, please. No contract required. Rules are below. I’m happy to gift the digital version, by the way.

Giveaway Rules

Void where prohibited. Must be 18 or older to participate. You must also leave me a way to contact you in your comment or commit to checking back on Thursday to see if you won.

Leave a comment by Midnight Pacific on Wednesday February 8, 2012. It’s more fun if your comment is amusing, but it doesn’t have to be.

International is OK, but I will probably have to send international winners a paper copy.

Posted in Former Riskies, Giveaways | Tagged Interview, Not Wicked Enough | 26 Replies

Giveaway Plus Regency Question of the Week

Updated on November 17, 2022 by carolyn

Goodreads Book Giveaway

Not Wicked Enough

by Carolyn Jewel

Giveaway ends March 20, 2012.

See the giveaway details
at Goodreads.

Enter to win

Regency Question of The Week

You have the cutest new reticule ever!!! What color is it, what’s inside it and how will the contents cause the brooding Earl of Stud-Lee to fall hopelessly in love with you?

(My reticule is pink. I have sixpence inside. Lord Stud-Lee will fall in love with me when I wager the entire sixpence on a game of whist in which he is the prize. And I win.

And what a prize he is.)

Go.

Posted in Former Riskies, Giveaways | Tagged Free Books, Lord Stud-Lee, Regency Question of the Week | 7 Replies

eBook Giveaway PLUS Contraception (Frank Talk)

Updated on November 17, 2022 by carolyn

Stuff to Win Again!

Congrats to the winners of last week’s giveaway of Not Wicked Enough. It was easy to give eBooks to the winners who preferred that reading format. In fact, it was so easy that I got to thinking that eBook readers don’t usually get to share in the giveaway love.

So.

I have decided to giveaway 20 eBook copies of Not Wicked Enough. Visit my blog to enter and for details and rules. Entry closes at midnight Pacific on February 16, 2012, so get there quick!

And now, on to my second topic.

Contraception during the Regency

In Not Wicked Enough, the hero, Mountjoy, uses a condom in a somewhat unusual way, in that he is not using it to prevent STDs but to prevent conception. Only, actually, I don’t believe it was all that unusual.

The common belief is that men used condoms only to prevent disease. This would not have been entirely effective of course, since many STDs would have passed through a condom made of gut. The history of condoms is a long one. There is evidence that the Romans used condoms, as did the Chinese and the Japanese. The fact that many of these early condoms covered only the head of the penis speaks rather loudly, I think, of the intention to prevent not disease but the transmission of sperm.

The point, really, is that humans the world over have made the connection between disease, pregnancy and intercourse, and that knowledge, however inaccurately they may have understood the underlying biological processes, is not new.

In Europe, Antonie van Leeuwenhoek “discovered” sperm circa 1677. The role of sperm in conception was well known by the Regency. The actual process of conception may not have been correctly understood, but one need only know that getting sperm into a woman was necessary for conception and that the penis was the sperm delivery system. Once you’ve figured this out, it strains credulity to suggest that no one then realized that if you inferred with the delivery system, you would vastly decrease the chance of conception. No sperm. No baby.

If a man wears a condom, he’s going to notice that the sperm stays inside the condom. He may, in fact, not care even a little that he has just reduced the chance of knocking up his partner. He may have worn the condom for the sole purpose of preventing disease. But it’s too obvious a connection for an educated, informed man not to make. In fact, there are historical mentions of the use of condoms as contraception throughout history.

Unquestionably, their use as a disease preventative is mentioned far more often. That makes sense. Men didn’t want to get the clap and in the West, men tend to own the discourse. And spin it, by the way.

It’s important to keep in mind the highly charged debate around contraception and female reproduction. This is NOT a subject people talked about frankly. As with references to access to abortion, the language is coded. And yet, throughout time and history, women have acted to control their reproduction through abstinence (which all women recognize is not always possible or even a choice they have) contraception, abortion, including self-mutilation once pregnant, and infanticide.

So, in Not Wicked Enough, Mountjoy is an educated man of means with access to other educated men of means. He has the money to purchase the very highest quality condoms. None of his peers would blink at his doing so. Men didn’t want to get the clap, after all. When he embarks on his affair with Lily, he is aware he can withdraw and thus interfere with the sperm delivery system. He even does so. But he does not want to continue with that method. And being the sort of man with access to condoms and who would know that a condom would also prevent the delivery of sperm, it’s impossible, in my opinion, for him not to also understand that if he wears a condom, he can finish inside and not put Lily at risk of conception. And that’s what he does.

Some condom Facts

In the Regency, the best condoms were made from highly processed gut that required the use of caustic chemicals. They would stiffen (HAH!) when completed and therefore needed to be soaked in liquid to soften before use. They were typically fastened to the base of the penis by a ribbon.

Make of it what you will, but condoms were washed (one prays about the washing part) and reused.

In this 1779 painting by German artist Johann Zoffany (Self-Portait as a Monk) on the wall to the left of the rosary beads and beneath the bottle are two condoms.

Airing out, one supposes.

Think about the title of this painting: Self-portrait as a Monk and then consider the presence of the condoms and all that is suggested by those two things.

Naturally a monk would also wish to avoid the clap, but oh, the coded images. A pregnant nun would be so awfully inconvenient.

Posted in Former Riskies | Tagged Condoms, Contraception, Giveaways | 9 Replies

Leap Repeat

Updated on November 17, 2022 by carolyn

I am in the middle of edits on deadline so tight my ears are popping. Thus, even though technically I’m getting an extra day, I am in a bit of a panic. You should check out this post from the past:

Alas, I can only provide you with a link since I don’t have time to actually steal the content.

As was the custom of late Victorian and Edwardian genre painters, Talbot Hughes had amassed an extensive collection of historical costumes and accessories as studio props dating from the 16th century through the 1870s. The collection was donated to the Victoria and Albert Museum after it had been exhibited at Harrods department store in 1913. Samples of Hughes’s costume collection remain on public view at the V&A to this day in the British Galleries
– Wikipedia

Basically, in 1913, a bunch of folks put on these gowns and they took pictures of them. Scroll down a bit to reach the Regency gowns.

Go here to see the photos.

And, just because I’m nice, here’s the Wikipedia entry for the Victoria and Albert museum, which is a pretty huge time suck. You’re welcome. You should be glad I’m not linking to the V&A because then you’d NEVER get free. Oh wait, I’m not that nice. Victoria&Albert Museum.

Posted in Former Riskies, Regency, Research | Tagged Clothes | 2 Replies

We’re all in Trouble Because I’ve been Thinking

Updated on November 17, 2022 by carolyn

Here’s what I’ve been thinking.

1. It’s important, to me, to know a lot about the historical era I write about (The Regency).

2. Some things were invented/discovered/thought of AFTER the Regency

3. People haven’t changed all that much.

4. People today have been affected by things invented/discovered/thought of AFTER the Regency.

5. Because of No. 4, people in the Regency used/believed/needed things we don’t today.

So. If you’re going to write historical fiction, you should know about the things invented/discovered/thought of AFTER the Regency so you don’t have your hero driving a car a wee bit before Henry Ford started mass producing the automobile.

Number 5 is interesting, though. There’s all these things we know nothing about that people in the Regency used every day. And it shaped their world and their view of the world.

How you interact with the spaces around you is different if there’s no electricity. When you enter a darkened room, you don’t automatically reach for the light switch and speed along into the room on your merry way.

Instead you have to go a little slower, maybe. You, or your servant, might be carrying a light source already. But it’s not as bright as electric light, right?

And if you don’t have your light source with you, then there should be one by the door. Where else would you put it? It has to be by the door so you don’t kill yourself walking about in the dark.

Since the room is darkened (assuming you didn’t bring your light with you) you have to pause to light a candle or a a lamp or something else before you proceed.

Now you’re carrying something flammable…. I’m not aware of non-flammable light sources until electricty came along (no sun, doh, the room is darkened, besides, the sun IS a flammable object) you need to be paying at least a little bit of attention to how and where you’re walking.

Your light source is also unlikely to light the entire room the way turning on the electric light does. Again, you probably have to watch your step.

We know there were clever ways to increase the amount of light in a room, mirrors, for example.

I really do sometimes just sit and think about all the ways things were different and how that shaped what people did. In the dark I can proceed to the light switch and flick. Instantaneous light fills the room. Now I can walk quickly to my destination. Also, I am not wearing layers and layers of clothes…. I am less encumbered by my clothes, I’m pretty sure, than a Regency lady was by hers.

I do my thing and turn out the light on my way out.

The Regency woman is either still carrying her light source or still followed by the servant with the light or is headed where she won’t need the light. But the light needed in the darkened room can’t be disposed of with a flick. Someone has to deal with that.

That what I was thinking lately. About all those extra things people had to do or think about. More steps. More work. More time.

Thank you Mr. Edison. And Mr. Tesla.

Posted in Former Riskies, Regency, Research, Writing | Tagged Lights, Thinking | 10 Replies