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I’m on the Smart Bitches/Dear Author podcast this week, interviewed by Sarah Wendell!

121. Talking historicals with Rose Lerner

x-posted from my tumblr.

I have been thinking of nothing but a Leverage/Les Misérables mash-up for DAYS.

The scene opens in a French galley. A prisoner about to be released is brought to see the guard.

NATE: You are a thief!
SOPHIE: I stole a loaf of bread!

Continue reading “Leveragérables: There's a new world for the winning”

Hello everyone, and welcome to my blog! I’ve done a round-up of some of my own favorite posts over the years (both here and when I’ve guested at other blogs), for people who are visiting for the first time:

[Last updated: 2/28/16]

Continue reading “Sticky post: Welcome!”

Something I have always found hilarious is how, when Napoleon escaped from Elba, Marshal Ney declared, “I will bring him to Paris in an iron cage!” and then, as soon as he actually saw Napoleon, he basically fell on his neck and became his right-hand man again. There’s something beautiful about it.

A lot of people love (and loved) Marshal Ney and are (and were) very upset about his execution (Wellington actually said that if he hadn’t been in the middle of some kind of argument with Louis XVIII at the time, he would have asked him to spare Ney as a personal favor). But I kind of feel like, you know what, if you love and look up to someone so much you are going to immediately go back over to their side, don’t announce that you will bring them to Paris in an iron cage! At that point, it’s sad, but you get what you get.

Here is a description of the incident in an 1821 encyclopedia:

This officer had, in an effusion of loyalty, repaired to the Tuileries, and proffering his services, had assured the king, on receiving the command of these troops, that he would bring Bonaparte to Paris in an iron cage. To which the king replied, with mild dignity, that this was not what he required, and that he only desired of the marshal to drive back the invader[…]The king, indeed, placed the fullest confidence in this general; and meeting with Madame Ney, two days afterwards, he said to her with emotion, ‘Madame, you have a husband whose loyalty is equal to his courage.’

Today I was reading the section on French folk tales in The Great Cat Massacre and Other Episodes in French Cultural History by Robert Darnton and I saw this: “Finally, the king assigns Petit Jean the seemingly impossible task of capturing the giant himself. The little hero sets off disguised as a monarch and driving a coach loaded with a huge iron cage.“

!!!

The tale then goes on:

‘Monsieur le roi, what are you doing with that iron cage?’ the giant asks. ‘I’m trying to catch Petit Jean, who has played all kinds of tricks on me,’ Petit Jean replies. ‘He can’t have been worse to you than to me. I’m looking for him, too.’ ‘But, Giant, do you think you are strong enough to catch him all alone? He is supposed to be terrifically powerful. I’m not sure that I can keep him locked up in this iron cage.’ ‘Don’t worry, Monsieur le roi, I can handle him without a cage; and if you like, I’ll test yours.’

Predictably, once the giant climbs into the cage, Petit Jean locks it and delivers the giant to the king.

Was Ney referring to this? And if so, does that make it more or less of a weird thing to say?

So a couple of days ago, I was looking at my shelf on Booklikes and saw that they were using the wrong cover for Cecilia Grant’s A Gentleman Undone: a Polish-language scholarly book on medieval history with a distinctly scholarly-book cover (sadly I didn’t take a screenshot and it’s fixed now! Does anyone have one?). Then this conversation happened on twitter:

[transcript of screencapped twitter convo:

Jackie Barbosa (‏@jackiebarbosa): Well, it certainly doesn’t look like anything anyone would be embarrassed to read on the subway!
Cecilia Grant ‏(@Cecilia_Grant): Maybe this will be the next trend in erotic romance covers! The scholarly look!
Isobel Carr ‏(@IsobelCarr): So tempted. May need to make a scholarly book cover for my site.
Jackie Barbosa (‏@jackiebarbosa): I know. I was thinking of trying it on something, just for funsies.
Me: Let’s start a meme!
Isobel: I suck at using GIMP, but I’m game to try.]

AND SO:

Inspiration: The English Town 1680-1840 by Rosemary Sweet. Image credit: Covent Garden Market, Westminster Election by Rowlandson and Pugin, via Wikimedia Commons.

Inspiration: The Jew in the Literature of England by Montagu Frank Modder. Image credit for the penny: photo by Detecting on Wikimedia Commons.

Inspiration: miscellaneous, but the formatting is from the Lancaster Pamphlets series, especially The Great Reform Act of 1832 by Eric J. Evans. I tried to do a weird background image with an old map of London but my GIMP skills were not sufficient to get the right look. Image: Redouté’s “Peruvian lily (Alstroemeria pelegrina)” from a Dover clipart book I have.

And a couple of bonus covers of two of my favorite classic historicals:

Inspiration: the Dodo Press edition of Godwin’s memoirs of Wollstonecraft. Image credit: victorianclassicantique.tumblr.com. If anyone knows the source beyond that, let me know!

Inspiration: Britain Before the Reform Act: Politics and Society 1815-1832 by Eric J. Evans. Image credit: Rob and Lisa Meehan’s photo on Wikimedia Commons.

ETA: At Cecilia Grant’s request, I did The Black Moth too:

Inspiration: Slave Women in Caribbean Society 1650-1838 by Barbara Bush. Image credit: This photo by D. Gordon E. Robertson via Wikimedia Commons.

Other authors’ covers: Isobel Carr, Jackie Barbosa, Olivia Waite, Ros Clarke.

What romance would you like to see with a scholarly cover?

ETA: I made a bunch more of these during my True Pretenses blog tour, for books by JR Ward, Meredith Duran, Theresa Romain, Molly O’Keefe, Susanna Fraser, and of course TP itself.

ETA2: Part 3. Listen to the Moon plus 10 more romances requested by commenters.

EEEEEEEEEEEE! Look what my friend gave me!

Yes! It’s a KitchenAid stand mixer! Mine died a couple of years ago and I have YEARNED, I have read recipes and despaired of making them, but now ALL THAT IS AT AN END. Thank youuuuuuu, kind friend! What should I make first?

I am strongly considering this Plum and Polenta Cake from The Tucci Cookbook, a lovely cookbook featuring, among other things, photos of Stanley Tucci in an apron using the brick oven in his backyard. Also, I need to share this piece of information with you:

STANLEY TUCCI [on proscuitto with figs]: “I find it to be an elegant and profoundly sexual appetizer–but since this is a family cookbook I’ll leave it at that!”

So, you know, if you want to add artistic verisimilitude to your fantasies about a dinner date with Stanley Tucci.

I’m adding a new feature to my blog posts, self-explanatorily entitled “Research book I am currently most excited about.” This week’s entry: The Rise of Provincial Jewry by Cecil Roth, 1950.

I swear I meant to post today, but guys, I am LITERALLY THREE SCENES AWAY (maybe four, whatever, LESS THAN FIVE IS THE POINT, LESS THAN FIVE) FROM THE END OF A ROUGH DRAFT OF CRIMSON JOY. So I spent all morning working on that, instead. There is nothing like the feeling of being ALMOST DONE, it’s like being on a bike going downhill, only without that oh shit oh shit feeling that I personally get when on a bike going downhill. Effortless and urgent, I think is what I want to convey. I am babbling. I have end-of-draft euphoria. I will have a rough draft of this book by the end of the week if not sooner. Oh world, I cannot hold thee close enough!

My critique partner, Susanna Fraser, has a new book out today from Carina Press: A Marriage of Inconvenience!

(She gets the best covers, seriously.) I read this book in critique group, and I can tell you that it’s awesome. The hero in particular has one of the most charming narrative voices I’ve ever seen in a romance. (Lucy is great too! I just can’t help loving James best.) It’s a prequel to her first book, The Sergeant’s Lady, a Peninsular War story that I believe is on sale this week if you haven’t already read it!

Susanna is doing a blog tour, giving away copies of the book at most of the stops, and she will be here on my blog on April 19th! Last time she talked about Team Wellington vs. Team Napoleon, I can’t wait to see what she comes up with this time.