Blog
Historical Fiction – deadly sin no 7 – mistaking it for a genre
Like most readers of historical fiction, I have my favourite eras. I love the seventeenth century, the Tudors and the medieval period, with the occasional foray into Victoriana, WWII and Greek myth. So I am unlikely to purchase anything set in the Napoleonic era,...
Cabinet of Curio-stories – An Apostle Spoon
I wonder what this spoon, which has survived for three hundred years, has stirred, or served, since it was first made? It is a 17thC Apostle spoon with an engraving of `Ave Maria` on the bowl. There are also further marks and chasings made during the Edwardian era, so...
Historical Fiction – deadly sin no 6 – the Aura of an Era
One of the things that attracts writers of historical fiction, is the lure of the past - its costumes, its pageantry, its beautiful buildings and architecture, many imbued with a craftsmanship mostly lost to us today. Often great love and attention is devoted to...
Cabinet of Curio-stories – Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn entwined
As a gift to King's College Chapel, Cambridge, Henry VIII erected a beautiful screen, the work of Renaissance Italian craftsmen. The work was carried out between 1533 and 1535 in the brief period when Anne Boleyn was Queen, and Henry's royal crown surmounts their...
Historical Fiction – deadly sin no 5 – The Length of Time
In the past, travelling took much longer. Because journeys took longer, messages took weeks to arrive, and news was days old by the time it reached you. Talking to historical fiction writers who are starting out, I often find that one of the first things they have had...
Historical Fiction – The Dark Lady’s Mask by Mary Sharratt
It is a brave writer that sets out to tackle anything about William Shakespeare and how he wrote his plays. Even more so when the author posits the idea that Shakespeare relied on a female poet as his collaborator. I dare say the novel will have its detractors,...
Historical Fiction – Deadly Sin no 4 – Lost or Glossary?
Like most historical novelists, I've spent much of my research time immersed in the everyday life of an earlier century, and my vocabulary has expanded. It has expanded to include words that most people have never heard of. As a novelist, this was brought home to me,...
Historical Fiction – Deadly Sin no 4 – Prologue vs Intrigue
When writing a historical novel and portraying a whole world, it is tempting to use a prologue as an introduction to the period you want your reader to inhabit. A prologue seems an ideal place to do this - to explain who conquered whom, who is on the throne, what the...
Fascinating old words for the historical novelist: ‘posnet’.
Whilst investigating something else entirely, I came upon an article in our local paper about the 'Carnforth Posnet'. This apparently was a rare bronze vessel dating from medieval times. Amazing what sidetracks I end up on, when I get to our local library's archives....
Historical Fiction – Deadly Sin 3 – Stuck in the Past
Excess Verbiage When I was growing up I read classic fiction such as Dickens, The Brontes, Dumas, and Blackmore. These were my formative influences, and nuances of their language still make their way into my books. This is both an advantage, and a disadvantage. On the...
Gilded Leather Glitz – 17th Century wallpaper
If you were an important personage in 17th Century Antwerp, your house would be furnished with gilded leather wallpaper, a status symbol of the rich merchant. Inevitably this fashion spread to England. On a visit to The Hague, I took this picture in the Mauritshuis...
Second of my historical fiction deadly sins – Purple Prose
Description Over-writing. It's a sin! Historical fiction demands that we paint a vivid picture of the past. To do this, we have to tell our story, describe a world, and still bring the novel in at a reasonable length. Unnecessary adverbs and adjectives must be the...
Sugar – The favourite ‘nip’ of the Tudors and Stuarts
Sugar became enormously popular in the 16th and 17th centuries. It was sold in loaves and wrapped in blue paper (patented 1666) to make it appear whiter. A sugar loaf could be from 8" to nearly 3 feet tall, but the smaller the loaf, the higher the quality and the...
Subtlety and Melodrama in Historical Fiction
Many of my books are set in the English Civil war, a time of high tempers, and of settling disputes by the sword. Writers of historical fiction find they are often writing against backgrounds of high tension. So with all the fighting, blood, gore, deaths and...
The strengths of a first historical novel #histfic
Before I came to write my first historical novel, The Lady's Slipper, most of my writing was contemporary. I read a lot of contemporary fiction as well as historical fiction. A few years ago I would have been surprised to find I had produced a historical novel. So why...