Scarlet Lions rampant!

I received this fabulous cross stitch the other day from Jenny in Canberra. We met on a reading list several years ago and our mutual interests have led to a solidifying of that friendship. Jenny is brilliant at cross stitch (but a bit modest and shy about it). Inspired by a reading of The Greatest Knight last year, she set out to design and stitch the Marshal blazon and here is the result! It now graces the wall in my second (tidier!) study along with my re-enactment equipment and other items of special interest to my writing. I'd like to say a warm public thank you to Jenny. It must have taken her ages!

Still on the Scarlet Lion front, I have just heard that the novel has been longlisted for the Romantic Novelists Association Award for the best Romantic novel of 2007. Details here: http://www.rna-uk.org/index.php?page=article&id=64
I'm keeping my fingers crossed, but since there are 22 novels on the longlist all told and some stiff competition, I'm not getting myself keyed up. If it happens it happens, if it doesn't it doesn't.
I have had the shortlist tee-shirt four times before and the longlist one twice now, so I suppose it becomes almost a little like business as usual. I don't meant that in a big-headed way or a world-weary way. There's still that spark of adrenaline, but having been there once and more than once, it's a bit more controlled and steady. It's nice though that the longlist is chosen by ordinary readers. We shall see what we shall see and in the meantime I'll just quietly get on with the day job!

Change of Plan!

So, there I am, reading away at the Chronica Majora and biographies of Simon de Montfort, Eleanor of Provence and the Bigot Earls of Norfolk, and I find my eyes glazing over. I begin to realise that writing a novel about the goings on in Henry III's reign isn't for me at the moment. The research is turning out a plot line that is a bit like 'A day at the office with swords'. The hero's wife is coming over as a female version of Tony Blair and the hero himself, being a sensible chappy most of the time, manages to keep himself hidden in the sticks for long periods of time - except for the moment when he has a hissy fit in parliament at Henry III and the 8 years he spends trying to divorce his wife. Bottom line - it seemed like a good idea at the time, but the warning lights had started to blink and I realised I really did not want to do this.
So, heaving a sigh, I moved to plan B, which really should have been plan A to begin with. This time, a big 'Yessssss' sang from my inner writing barometer. The preliminary research has been going very well indeed, the psychic Akashic Record material is fabulous and I can't wait to get started. And who are the stars of the new project? Well, still Roger of Norfolk, but the second earl who was a contemporary of William Marshal and the man responsible for building Framlingham Castle. He married Ida de Tosney, one of Henry II's concubines and the mother of William Longespee, earl of Salisbury. Like William Marshal, Roger had to fight his way from lower down the food chain. In his case he was fighting his way back, rather than up. His father, Hugh Bigod had taken the side of the Young King in the rebellion of 1173 and in consequence, when he died, Henry used a family inheritance dispute to take away the main Bigod strongholds of Framlingham and Bungay and withhold the title of earl. He never did give it to Roger, who had to wait for Richard to come to the throne before he could regain his lands and his title. Behind the scenes there is one hell of a lot of juicy family conflict that would put any modern soap opera to shame - and it echoes down the generations. An additional bonus will be guest appearances from William Marshal and his family. What's not to like on the author's side?
As some blog readers will know, I use the Akashic Records, sometimes known as Remote Viewing, to augment my research. I did a session with my friend yesterday and here, as a small gift, is her description of Roger of Norfolk's physical features:
'He's got ordinary coloured hair - mousey-gold-brown, with a fringe and wavy bits at the side. It's quite fine and floaty but there's lots of it. High cheekbones, straight, very nice eyebrows, tapering at the ends. His nose has a slight bump in the middle. It isn't thin, quite broad at the base. His eyes are intelligent and sensitive and the colour is grey-blue, but more on the grey side. His lips are wide and fine at the ends like his brows, and they're well proportioned. He has a square chin. I feel those features have become finer and sharper since I saw him when he was younger.'
I think I'm going to enjoy working with him - and with Ida. I was going to say 'but that's another story' but it isn't. It's the same one!

The sketch of Framlingham Castle as it might have appeared in the 13thC is from the book Reconstructing The Past by Alan Sorrell

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A grave situation for William Marshal

Embarking on research for the untitled not quite work in progress I found myself obliged to print out all 1,500 pages of the translation of Matthew Paris' Chronica Majora. It's an interesting account of life in the 13thC during the reign of Henry III. Paris needs to be read with caution as he's not always accurate and certainly not impartial. He also tends to go off at sudden tangents. One minute the reader is involved in what the King wore or the state of the weather, the next there's a six page discourse on the prophet Mahommed. Sometimes his writing seems a bit like the old advertising logo for Windows. 'Where do you want to go today?' Thus the reader never quite knows what's coming from page to page.
Even so it's a fascinating read. While waiting for the pages to print I came across this piece.

'When the aforesaid brave and warlike William, surnamed the " Mareschal" (as though " Seneschal of Mars"), was indulging in slaughter and pillage in Ireland, and was acquiring a large territory, he presumptuously and by force took away from a certain holy bishop two manors which belonged to his church, and held possession of them as if they were his own by a just claim,
because they were acquired in war. The bishop in consequence, after frequent warnings, to which the earl replied
with insolence, still retaining possession of the said manors, and contumaciously persisting in his sin, fulminated sentence
of excommunication against him, and with good cause ; but this the earl despised, and, pleading as an excuse that it was in the time of war, he heaped injury on injury. It was owing to these proceedings of his, that one Master Gervase de
Melkeley, composing verses on him, and speaking as if in the person of the earl, said,—
Sum quern Saturnum sibi sensit Hybernia ; Solem Anglia; Mercurium Normannia; Gallia Martem. [In Ireland I am Saturn ; in England the Sun's rays surround me :In Normandy I'm Mercury, but France for ever Mars has found me.]
The said earl, then, held these manors under his jurisdiction all his life. After some years he died, and was buried
at the New Temple, in London, which circumstance coming to the knowledge of the aforesaid bishop (it was the bishop
of Femes, who had been a monk of the Cistercian order, an Irishman by birth, and a man of remarkable sanctity), he,
though not without much personal labour, went to the king, who was at the time staying at London, and, making a heavy
complaint of the above mentioned injury done to him, declared that he had excommunicated the said earl for the
same, not without good cause : he then begged of the king, by his royal authority and warrant, for the release of the
soul of the said Earl William, to restore his manors to him, that the deceased might obtain the benefit of absolution.
The king, touched with sorrow at hearing this, asked the bishop to go to the earl's tomb and absolve him, promising that
he would himself see that satisfaction was given him. The bishop therefore went to the tomb, and, in the presence of
the king and many other persons, as if a live person was addressing a living one in the tomb, said, " William, you who
are entombed here, bound with the bonds of excommunication, if the possessions which you wrongfully deprived my
church of be restored, with adequate satisfaction, by the agency of the king, or by your heir, or any one of your
relations, I absolve you ; if otherwise, I confirm the said sentence, that, being involved in your sins, you may remain
in hell a condemned man for ever." The king, on hearing this, became angry, and reproved the immoderate severity of
the bishop. To this the latter replied, " Do not be astonished, my lord, if I am excited ; for he despoiled my church
of its greatest advantage." The king then, privately, spoke to William, the earl's eldest son, and heir of all his property,
who was now invested with

Getting to grips with the Medieval mindset is one of the things I enjoy about writing historical fiction. I think it a tad suspicious re the bishop's curse and I suspect it was inserted after the demise of William's sons. But did the bishop come to England to remonstrate with William's sons about his lost manors and attempt to trade them in exchange for lifting the excommunication? Is that part true? One can imagine the theatre of threatening the entombed corpse of one of the greatest scions of chivalry before the King and court - or one can try to imagine. I think William II showed remarkable restraint!

It'll be interesting to see what other nuggets turn up during my read of the Chronica....

New Year, New Project

As a jobbing author I have always have to be in front of myself, which can disconcerting and distracting. I traveled on a fantastic emotional journey with William Marshal in The Greatest Knight and The Scarlet Lion. The former came out in paperback in July of 06 and the latter in hardcover in December, with a paperback release of The Scarlet Lion due this summer. To my readers these are fresh and new. To me it's an ongoing part of a process that has lasted at least twelve months and has to share the stage with other projects. Even as the first reviews come in for The Scarlet Lion and Little Brown gear up for the paperback, I have just handed in last year's work in progress to my agent. A Place Beyond Courage, the story of John Marshal, will be published in hardcover in October2007. As from today I am on tenterhooks awaiting that first all important response to what took me all of 2006 to write. However, I also have to focus on the next contracted project for 2008. It's a bit like being a breeding parent all over again. I have to give my attention to the forthcoming paperback (the toddler), the new baby (the hardcover) and the pregnancy (work in progress!) Then of course there are the older children with their various needs (the backlist). I wouldn't swap my job for anything in the world, it's what I've wanted to do all my life, but there's certainly never a dull moment!
Happy New Year to all!
Elizabeth :-)